Living and dead museums

      Vietnam has around 150 museums, with around 20 in Hanoi. The number of museums in the capital is increasing but few of them are attractive to visitors.
Healthy museums
The Vietnam Ethnology Museum is one of few museums in Hanoi that sells entrance tickets at high prices, VND25,000 ($1.4)/adult, but it attracts the highest number of visitors among museums in the capital city.
The volume of visitors coming to this museum is increasing. According to the museum’s statistics, it welcomed more than 200,000 visitors last year. During holidays or when the museum hosts big events, it has up to 10,000 visitors.
“I have to pay to get into this museum but the money is worth it. This museum has many exhibits, vast space and special architecture. I can learn more cultural knowledge and relax when I come here,” said Nguyen Bich Hue, from Ha Dong, Hanoi.
Besides having a beautiful space, the Vietnam Ethnology Museum always changes itself by expanding and having new zones of exhibitions. It regularly organises exhibitions and cultural activities. The museum’s website has useful and practical information about its activities.
Other museums that also have stable numbers of visitors are the Vietnam History Museum and the Vietnam Revolution Museum. These museums are near each other so visitors often go to one right after the other.
The Ho Chi Minh Museum is also a popular destination for tourists because it is next to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. Not far from the mausoleum are the People’s Army Museum and the Military History Museum. These sites also have a consistent numbers of visitors, because they have many objects.
Living or dead museums?
The Vietnam Ethnology Museum is very crowded. Not far from it, the Museum of Tanks and Armored Forces is very quiet. The number of visitors visiting this site per day is a handful and visitors are mainly soldiers of the tank and armored forces. It is quiet because this museum has repetitive and simple objects. Part of the museum’s area is used to host a café and a glass store.
Like this museum, the Museum of Engineer Corps and the Museum of Air Defence and Air Force usually only serve soldiers of these forces.
The Women’s Museum is located on a nice site on Ly Thuong Kiet road but it is not an attractive museum. This site is frequently used to organise wedding parties and part of its yard is hired as a pottery shop.
The Hanoi Police Museum at 67 Ly Thuong Kiet was inaugurated around half a year ago but it was closed when we went there. The guard said construction hadn’t been completed so it hadn’t opened yet.
Hanoi has many more museums but perhaps many Hanoians don’t know their names.
More museums built
While most museums in Hanoi fail to attract visitors, new museums have been built or are being built. Museums have similar contents so the public questions their real functions.
Visitors may get the impression that most Vietnamese museums are similar, except for the unique ones like the Vietnam Ethnology Museum, the Vietnam Art Museum, and the Vietnam History Museum, which have different exhibits from the others. The remaining museums have similar things. To be fair, each object has its own history, but they are basically the same.
“Our museums are too poor. Objects are similar. I visited the Revolution Museum, the People’s Army Museum, the Military History Museum, the Museum of Tanks and Armored Forces and the Museum of Engineer Corps and I saw the same things – soldier’s hats, soldier’s uniforms, guns, letters, hoes, and shovels. Of course, each museum has different objects, but they look similar and boring,” said Le Minh Hang, 120 Hoang Quoc Viet, Hanoi.
The similarity of most museums is possibly because of the movement of building museums of all sectors. The military forces have up to 25 museums of all kinds (operational and to be built).
Meanwhile, there are many projects to build museums related to nature on the table, including the Vietnam Nature Museum, Museum of Trees, Museum of Ornamental Creatures, and the Museum of Aquatic Creatures. The public is worried about a surplus of museums.
Besides the idea to build a museum about rubber, there are plans or ideas to build such museums as the Museum of Vietnam’s Young Generations, Museum of Banks, Money Museum, Aviation Museum, Medical Museum, Postal Museum, Oil and Gas Museum, Education Museum, Transportation Museum, Architecture Museum, Museum of Application Art, Museum of Agriculture, Cement Museum, Stamp Museum, Coal Museum and Chemical Museum.
Look outside, think inside
Many countries and territories in the world have small numbers of museums. However, their museums are very big. At the Museum of Antiques in Taiwan, visitors need more than one week to enjoy all the exhibits. The Shanghai Museum in China is also a great work. It vividly describes the history of Shanghai and visitors really live through the history of this city in different periods.
Famous museums in the world are special works, where visitors have to queue to buy tickets and they can return there several times to re-discover them. Meanwhile, visitors only need a short time to digest Vietnam’s museums and they don’t ever need to return to that table again.