It took many years to get the paper mill up and running. This was no doubt a very generous undertaking, paid for by Swedish taxpayers. And in the end the cost escalated to almost four times the original budget. With an investment close to 500 million dollars of the day, the project was very large for a small country like Sweden. The paper mill would be located in Bãi Bằng, about 90 kilometers northwest of Hanoi. In the late 1960s an agreement was signed between the two countries to build a paper mill that would tap Scandinavian expertise in this sector. Olof Palme was adamant in Sweden supporting Vietnam’s priorities, whatever these were. Why and by whom he was murdered remains a mystery. He was probably the only head of state who didn’t have personal security, or body guards.
#Abba happy new year movie
In 1986 he was assassinated in the streets of Stockholm, as he was leaving a movie theater with his wife. Among other daring initiatives, he was the first Western head of government to visit Cuba after its revolution. A fierce critic of the foreign policy of both the United States and the Soviet Union, he was known for his uncompromising non-alignment, and for his support of Third World countries. Olof Palme was the Swedish Prime Minister at the time. Driven by strong ethical principles, and rightfully indignant about the absurdity and the carnage of the American War, Sweden was unusual in having an embassy in Hanoi, and a large development cooperation program with Vietnam. Comparing with the war period, Hanoians saw them like “Americans without the dollars”.īut there was one, only one, Western country that maintained a close relationship with Vietnam. There were just a few Russians around, visiting as part of cooperation missions. The only links with foreign countries were with brotherly nations in the Soviet Bloc. How it came to be seen that way is very telling about the history of Hanoi.īack in the 1980s, in the middle of the subsidy period, Vietnam was mostly closed to the outside world. In fact, ABBA’s “Happy New Year!” is probably the most spirited and revered song of Vietnam after "Tiến Quân Ca", the epic national anthem written and composed by Văn Cao in 1944. However, Hanoians of all ages know the song. Elsewhere in the world the Swedish band ABBA has become a distant memory, vaguely remembered as a cheerful and slightly tacky group whose music was very successful… but not particularly inspiring. Buy it here.As the Lunar New Year approaches, the old ABBA song “Happy New Year!” is played again and again, almost in a loop, by radio stations and city shops in and around Hanoi. The limited edition 7-inch ‘Happy New Year’ single is released on 7 December.
The album topped the Swedish chart for four weeks, and reached the top 20 in the UK, Norway and Australia. 12 in Denmark.īenny Andersson revisited the melody for his September 2018 album Piano, performing the track as a slow piano solo. In 1999, it attracted a cover by the Stockholm-based ABBA tribute quartet A*Teens, which also peaked at No.
The song became a top five hit in the group’s native Sweden in 2008 and again the following year, when it also reached the top five in Norway.Ģ010 saw ‘Happy New Year’ in the Swedish top ten once again, and in the era of streaming, like many other festive and holiday-themed standards, it reappears regularly on many charts around the world. With lead vocals by Agnetha Fältskog, the track was released as a single in a few countries at the time, notably Holland, Brazil and Portugal, but went on to greater chart activity in later years.
According to some fan sites, it had the working title ‘Daddy Don’t Get Drunk On Christmas Day.’ The track first appeared when the Super Trouper album was released as the group’s seventh studio album in November 1980. ‘Happy New Year’ was written by ABBA’s Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus during a working holiday in Barbados.