The rundown house at 41 Cumberland Road in Hong Kong’s quiet district of Kowloon Tong might escape the notice of passers-by if it weren’t for a sign signaling that it is a “love hotel.”
Rooms are offered for rent by the hour, with a discount rate of HK$205 (US$25) buying amorous couples three hours in a tatty room off a narrow hallway decorated with a poster of a topless blonde.
It is a far cry from when the building was the home of kung fu icon Bruce Lee (李小龍) in the years before his untimely death in 1973 at the age of 32.
PHOTO: AFP
“The house has definitely been altered,” said Shannon Lee, the actor’s daughter, who recalled snickering when she learned about the home’s love hotel status in her mid-teens.
In glaring contrast to its current appearance, the now 40-year-old Lee remembers a Japanese-style pond out front, pets running around and plenty of exercise space for her father.
“I have very fond memories of it — my father definitely valued his privacy and there was space for him to work out and the kids to run around,” she said.
The fact that guests walk in the footsteps of the kung fu star might have faded into the mists of time had it not been for fans who rallied behind a plan to turn the hotel into a Lee memorial.
Following a public uproar, billionaire owner Yu Pang-lin (余彭年) agreed to cancel plans to sell the property, which he says is worth HK$100 million and instead donate it to honor Lee’s legacy.
Yu has said the home should be renovated to include a museum, a library, a cinema and martial arts area. Others, including Bruce Lee Club chairman Wong Yiu-keung (黃耀強), want the original floor plan preserved so visitors can imagine how it looked when the actor lived there.
“It should be a memorial house. After all it’s his former residence,” Wong said.
Lee — who was credited with catapulting the martial arts film genre into the mainstream with films including Fists of Fury and the posthumously released Enter the Dragon — died after a severe reaction to pain medication.
His widow, now living in the US, has provided a rough blueprint of the home’s original layout to help restoration efforts.
“My mom is definitely behind it,” Shannon Lee said.
“I’m really in favor of [the memorial]. It could be great for Hong Kong and great for my father and his legacy. I think the primary goal should be to preserve the house as much as possible to its original condition,” she said.
“The draw of this space was that it was his home,” she said. “That makes it very unique.”
A local design contest ended last month, but the memorial’s final look, building costs, who will pay them and when it opens remain unclear.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
Polish presidential candidates offered different visions of Poland and its relations with Ukraine in a televised debate ahead of next week’s run-off, which remains on a knife-edge. During a head-to-head debate lasting two hours, centrist Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, from Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s governing pro-European coalition, faced the Eurosceptic historian Karol Nawrocki, backed by the right-wing populist Law and Justice party (PiS). The two candidates, who qualified for the second round after coming in the top two places in the first vote on Sunday last week, clashed over Poland’s relations with Ukraine, EU policy and the track records of their
‘A THREAT’: Guyanese President Irfan Ali called on Venezuela to follow international court rulings over the region, whose border Guyana says was ratified back in 1899 Misael Zapara said he would vote in Venezuela’s first elections yesterday for the territory of Essequibo, despite living more than 100km away from the oil-rich Guyana-administered region. Both countries lay claim to Essequibo, which makes up two-thirds of Guyana’s territory and is home to 125,000 of its 800,000 citizens. Guyana has administered the region for decades. The centuries-old dispute has intensified since ExxonMobil discovered massive offshore oil deposits a decade ago, giving Guyana the largest crude oil reserves per capita in the world. Venezuela would elect a governor, eight National Assembly deputies and regional councilors in a newly created constituency for the 160,000
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
RSS