Erection

It is true that Bruce Lee died in the apartment of the actress Ting Pei.

It is also true that his body was found in her bed. But other rumours were not confirmed.

There is a story, seldom heard, which goes like this:

When the police arrived, a large group of reporters had gathered. They saw the body covered in a sheet being carried out. Everybody rushed in and shouted the same question, “Is it true that Bruce Lee died in the middle of having sex?"

The medic drove the ambulance away without giving any answer.

Of course, the reporters and photographers jumped into cars and taxis and followed. At the morgue, the body was swiftly wheeled in and the doors were closed.

Hours passed. They waited anxiously.

The door opened and a shabby character from the morgue came out for a smoke.

“Is it true that Bruce Lee’s lower part was still left upstanding?" This was rumoured by everybody.

“It’s true," came the answer.

“Ow!" Everyone was gripped.

“Please let us in to take a photo," they all begged.

“It will cost you," the shabby caretaker announced.

“How much? How much?" they all screamed at the same time.

“500 Dollars."

Five hundred in the early seventies was a large sum and they hesitated.

The caretaker turned to leave.

“Wait! Wait!" they shouted. “At least you have to let one of us take a look before we call for permission."

The caretaker scratched his head and nodded unwillingly.

One of the reporters was chosen. The caretaker opened up a small gap to let him peep.

And Lo! There was an object standing rock- firm under the bed sheet!

He returned and confirmed it to his colleagues.

There were no mobile phones then, so everybody lined up at the phone booth. With such big news, of course the editors said, “Yes!"

After all of them had handed over the money to the caretaker, he instructed, “All of you! Enter one by one!"

Everybody was trying to grasp the opportunity to take the first shot and in the chaos no one heard his words, they all rushed in together.

There was no time for the caretaker to stop them.

The door was thrown open wide, and in blew a strong gust of wind.

The sheet was blown up in the air.

There lay two pillows lined up vertically and a pair of chopsticks stuck in between.

There was no body and no erection.

Everybody wanted their money back, but the caretaker was nowhere to be found.

The Statue

Years ago, I produced a movie based on the Chinese classic novel ‘The Water Margin’. One scene involved the hero fighting a tiger. We did our research and found a tiger in Thailand.

It had acted in many Thai movies and had become quite a star. We arrived in the jungle with a temple up on the hill.

The children in the nearby villages gathered to marvel at it. The tiger seemed friendly.

“Does it like children?" I asked.

“Yes," the trainer replied humorously, “for food."

Everything was set and we were ready to begin filming.

Suddenly, dark clouds gathered and a strong wind started to blow. The camera jammed. The tiger went on strike. Everything went wrong. We had to stop filming and I was in a panic. There was nothing I could do except run around in circles. The local production manager saw this and said to me, “This is the holy ground of a temple. Since you are working here, why not go to the temple and pray?"

As I could not do anything else, it sounded like a good idea. I climbed up the hill with offerings. The temple was one of the smallest I had seen. The Buddha statue was made of stone. The roof had been blown off and the statue was exposed to wind and rain. Its face was blurred and expressionless. Usually believers would cover the statue with gold leaf, but not this one. Business must have been bad. Nobody ever came here to pray.

I knelt down in front of the statue and began to bargain, “I am no Buddhist and I don’t believe in God. I came here to ask for smooth filming. If there is a true God, please show me a sign in ten minutes, or else I will leave without wasting time."

Ten minutes passed. I seemed to be enlightened.

There were no miracles, but the impression of the statue settled in my mind.

I made a deep bow and returned to where I came from.

The director was yelling, the crew surrounded me and kept asking, “What shall we do? What shall we do?"

I did not say a thing. I just looked at them blankly and without expression like the statue. Everybody calmed down. And then, a miracle did occur, good weather returned, the tiger began to behave, the camera rolled. We shot the scene without any problems.

Taking the hill road on the way back, we passed the temple. A ray of sunlight fell upon the Buddha, and he seemed to smile.

The Inquest

Raymond Chow, the president of Golden Harvest Studios was one of the smartest men I have known.

When Bruce Lee died, the insurance company refused to pay his family. They said that during the autopsy, remains of marijuana were found in Bruce Lee’s stomach. The cause of death might have been a drug overdose which was not be covered by insurance. The widow was thrown into turmoil because famous as Lee was, he did not leave a big fortune behind.

Chow immediately contacted two people in Australia. At the inquest, the insurance company presented their case. Chow’s lawyer who represented the widow called his two witnesses.

“Please state your profession," the lawyer asked.

“Professor at Melbourne University."

“For how many years?"

“Twenty."

“Majoring?"

“The study of marijuana."

“In the years of your study, has anyone ever died after taking marijuana?"

“No, sir."

“No more questions, Your Honour."

The next witness appeared. Same questions and the same answers, except for one. “For how many years?"

“Thirty," said the old professor.

The judge announced the verdict.

The insurance company was ordered to pay.

Iron Chef Episode

The Iron Chef was the most extravagant Japanese cooking show in the nineties when the country’s economy was booming. In one episode the cost of food alone could go as high as US$7,115,520. The TV show was so successful that it lasted nearly 7 years and continued to influence all the food shows in the world until this day.

All the best chefs in the world, including Alain Passard and Pierre Gagnaire were lured into competing with the Japanese Iron Chefs every week. The show invited me as the guest judge because of my knowledge of food. I said “yes", only if I could say what I want. The other judges were polite but not me. So the Japanese gave me a nickname, “Karakuchi" which means chilli mouth.

When the Best Iron Chef, Michiba Rokusaburo presented me with a dish of lobster, I said to him, “Take it away, it’s too tough."

He bowed deeply and accepted the comment by replying, “Yes, I overcooked it."

The audience cheered, for they were getting tired of politeness and they loved me.

I was asked to return many times. During the show, I noticed the verdict was not always fair.

There were three judges, two of them were Japanese. They always sided with the TV station. They felt if their own Iron Chefs lost too often, they would lose face. So the two Japanese judges gave higher marks to the Iron Chefs to make sure they won instead of the challenger.

This annoyed me, so I cooked up a scheme to counter it.

The full mark was 10. The two Japanese judges, being polite in their nature, would give the Iron Chef 8 and the challenger 5 or 6. If the challenger was a better cook, I would give him 10 and the Iron Chef 0. It balanced the winning points in favour of the challenger whom I liked. This happened a few times. The TV station got smart and increased the number of judges to four or even five. I lost interest and never appeared on the show again.

Well, the guest appearances as a judge opened doors for me to the best restaurants in Japan. Even Nobu treated me as a VIP when I walked into his TriBeCa restaurant. Years later, I retired from movie making and led groups of top gourmets to eat around the world. I managed to get reservations at the finest restaurants in Japan.

Another funny thing happened not too long ago. I received a big sum of money as royalties for image rights.

A Pachinko machine maker used content from the ‘Iron Chef’ to create a game. They made it very difficult for the iron balls to enter the “Karakuchi" hole!

Kitchen Hazard

In Barcelona, Jackie, Samo and I lived in apartments with individual kitchens. When we were not filming, we would cook and cook and cook.

One day, Samo ran out of chillies and asked his wife to borrow some from me.

I grabbed a bunch of Habaneros and handed them to her.

Without knowing that these were one of the hottest chillies in the world, Samo said disparagingly, “Chua Lam is a really stingy fellow giving me these dry old chillies."

He chopped up the Habaneros and the phone rang. Forgetting to wash his hands, he picked the receiver and had a chat with his friend. After he hung up, he went to the loo.

He was on fire for three days.

The Big Toy

The greatest joy of being a producer is to treat making a movie like a big toy.

When I first came to Hong Kong, traditional brothels were banned. I heard so many interesting stories about them from the older people I met. So I decided to produce a movie called ‘Profiles of Pleasure’ about this period.

I chose a director who used to be a production designer and was meticulous about his work detail. He studied everything and built a set in the Golden Harvest studio with a certain rawness about the whole thing.

The twenty-course cuisine on the table was carefully researched and recreated, including bottles of antique Hennessy Brandy. The movie starred the most beautiful actresses and it was fun for me to design Cheongsam for the ladies.

For the role of the rich client, I decided to guest star my good friend Nee Kuang who was quite famous in Hong Kong, appearing in a variety of TV shows, newspapers and magazines.

When I saw everything was in place and that the shooting would take the whole night, I went home.

In the middle of the night, my phone rang.

“Mr. Nee drank up the four bottles of brandy and has completely passed out! What am I to do?" The director was in a panic.

“You mean to tell me you haven’t seen any drunken man in bars before?" I answered coolly.

“I know what to do," the director said.

He shot the scene with all the girls laughing at an unconscious Mr. Nee.

Italian Name

My name is Chua Lam in my native language Chiu Chow, and Cai Rai in Mandarin. It was difficult for my Spanish crew to remember. So, one day they gathered and said to me, “We have decided to call you Mario!"

“We are in Spain!" I protested. “Give me a Spanish name like Jose, Leonardo or Javier instead! Why Italian?"

They answered in unison, “Because you eat like one!"

Thank You, Pandemic

During the Cultural Revolution when human beings suffered some of the worst conditions ever known, a man walked past a pond and found some duckweed. He took some home and put them in a teacup with water. Every day he appreciated how the plant grew. His wife watched and the love she had for him flourished too.

There are always things we want to do but never have the time. Being in lockdown we have found ourselves having all the time in the world. Let’s do all those things we wanted! If we let one day pass doing nothing then we lose the battle. If we can do something like the man with the duckweed, we win the war.

A little pickle will improve your appetite a long way! Cut the hearts of any vegetables into the size you prefer, rub them in salt and leave for a while. Dry them in paper towels and put them into a jar. Pour half jar of vinegar and half jar of boiled water (tap water contains micro bacteria which will spoil the vegetables). Add some sugar and turn the jar upside down. Leave it for a day or two and then your pickle is done. If you like your pickle savoury instead of sour, pour in some fish sauce. You can buy this in any Asian supermarket easily. Add garlic, chilli and a little sugar. It is so good you won’t be able to stop eating it.

Make your own ice cream.

You do not need an expensive ice cream machine, simply two sealable plastic bags. Ice cream is not difficult, it is just made from ice and cream! Put cream with condensed milk in a small sealable bag. Then put ice and lots of sea salt in a large bag. Place the small bag inside the big and shake vigorously. Ice cream has now been made. If in doubt, watch a video on YouTube.

Write down your resume and squeeze it into a QR code. Use it for your social media to save time telling people about yourself.

Compile a list of songs and music that you have liked in the past. Share it with others.

Write emails to your old friends. Send them photos you took together.

There are hundreds of things you have been wanting to learn. Study them now.

There are thousands of things you have been wanting to do but did not have the time. Do them now.

My accomplishment is this book in English, for my friends who do not read Chinese.

I hope you like it. Thank you, pandemic.