The 2008 San Francisco Tet Festival Committee, for the Year of the Rat, would like to extend our sincere gratitude to the distinguished guests, generous donors, friends, and organizations that helped to make the event successful. They are The San Francisco RVN Veterans Association who performed the Flags Salutation in the Opening Ceremony, The S.F Women Mutual Assistance Association, The S.F Senior Assistance Association, Au Co Cultural Center, Thang Long Educational Center, the media agencies in the Bay Area such as Asian Week, Mo Magazine in S.F and Oakland,  VietVungVinh.com   and others.

We especially appreciate the presence of distinguished guests such as Mr. Ed Lee representing the Mayor of San Francisco, State Senator Carole Midgen, State Assemblyman Mr. Mark Leno, State Assemblywoman Ms. Fiona Ma, Ms Harriet Ishimoto, representing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Mr. Aaron Peskin, President of S.F Board of Supervisor, and other Supervisors Chris Daly, Ross Mirkarimi, Carmen Chu, S.F Police Chief Heather Fong, the S.F Fire Department, The Mayor Office of the Community Development (MOCD), Grants for the Arts, Mr. Sean Do from the District Attorney’s office who came to cut the ribbons in the Grand Opening Ceremony. We also would like to extend our thanks to Miss Pageant of Little Saigon in San Francisco, the volunteers who helped our organizing committee in greeting guests, selling lottery tickets and collecting donations from public audience. Despite the chilly and rainy weather, many compatriots came to attend the festival, and stayed until the end of the event. Their attendance in large number was a great encouragement to our organizing committee, and it also showed the power and the solidarity of the Vietnamese community in San Francisco. We also want to thank businesses and organizations and religious and educational groups in the city that occupied the 80 kiosks. They made a great contribution to the success of the Tet Festival. We would like to express our deep gratitude to the Emcees of the event such as Ms. Kim Oanh, Mr. Nam Loc, and Mr. Quang Chanh. We are grateful for the performances of AMV productions, the Lang Du Musical Band, and our favorite singers such as Minh Tuyet, Huong Thuy, Manh Quynh, Trinh Lam and other talented artists. We would like to say thanks to our beautiful young dancers from the Bach Viet folkdance group, the Hip Hop dancers from Philip Burton High School, and the Red Panda Acrobats Gymnastic Team…All of you did a wonderful job in making San Francisco Tet Festival successful. We acknowledged with gratitude such traditional offerings such as firework, the Lion Dance, and the delivery of Lucky Red Envelopes to children. Last, but not least, we tried our best to organize the event; however, we could not avoid mistakes. We would like to apologize for these shortcomings. Again, on behalf of the Organizing Committee, we appreciate very much your support, and wish to see you in the 2009 Tet Festival, the Year of the Buffalo. 

San Francisco, February 16, 2008 

The Year of the Rat –Tet Festival Committee

Lien Nguyen, Chairwoman