Happy Lunar New Year!

Former softcore pin-up girl with current hardcore pin-up guy

Oh wait, the above photo has THAT GUY in it! You know, the one who’s at the center of Hong Kong’s bizarre media circus that needs its own Wong Jing parody film. Frankly, the “thing involving the pictures that resemble people who’ve worked with Charlene Choi” is all anyone can talk about over here. I would add to the constant buzzing in your ears, but it’s still not over and it seems that I change my mind about it every single day. Maybe I’ll say something afterwards.

A week or so ago, I said I wouldn’t make fun of it because it involved criminal activity and frankly, I was tired of the media coverage. I’m still tired of it, but now the whole thing has escalated to the point where I have to make fun of it simply because it’s the only way I can deal with the constant barrage of news and gossip related to He Who Shall Not Be Named.

No, not Voldemort. I’m talking about this guy again.

“I’m a good person!”

Um…no, you’re not.

At this point, everyone will come out of this debacle looking bad, including the participants, the victims, the media, the police, and the overexcited and frankly overjudgmental public. I’d give everyone a giant raspberry, but it’s so cold that I feel drained of the required energy to complete such an action. Instead, I’m providing this picture to illustrate how I see the entire mess:

I’m betting on the kangaroo.

Sudden subject change: some weeks ago, I blogged briefly about my Andy Lau concert experience. Basically, it consisted of me marveling at the man’s endless energy, willingness to put himself in danger, and his unparalleled pitchman abilities. The concert was fun, because Andy Lau was Andy Lau. Accept no substitutes.

“Thanks, Kozo!”

However, Andy Lau’s concert was only the second I’ve attended in my three years since moving to Hong Kong. The first one was Sammi Cheng’s back in May. Actually, I’ve seen her in concert twice before in the states, so basically this latest Sammi concert I attended was just like old home week. The fact that Sammi and I have both aged adds to the metaphor.

I actually wrote a Life with Kozo column about my Sammi Cheng Hong Kong concert experience back in May 2007, but it never saw print because I never got around to posting it. It’s buried somewhere on my hard drive along with some, uh, pictures I don’t want anyone to see.

These pants no longer contain any mysteries

Thankfully, I attended my third concert just recently. I lucked into a ticket to one of Jacky Cheung’s remaining concerts here in Hong Kong. Here are some shots from Yahoo HK:

“This one’s for you people in the crappy seats!”

Only Jacky is allowed to wear a jacket.

 

Jacky said during the concert that the dancers were all masked in order to make him look better. Personally speaking, I don’t think Jacky is all that bad looking, though someone I once knew had him classified in the “ugly guy, good singer” category, the implication being that there’s a category called “pretty guy, bad singer.” You can figure out who goes into that category yourself.

But I enjoyed Jacky’s concert a bit more than Andy Lau’s, to be honest. Andy is pure entertainment, but as a singer, Jacky clearly wins. Also, I sat in the cheap seats so I had no choice but to appreciate Jacky for his vocal range and ability to act effeminate without ever threatening his manhood. The man is multi-talented.

A sample of my perspective that evening:

The lightsabers were free

Sadly, Jacky did not have a guest performer - which really sucked because I was expecting something like this:

The number of people in this photo also attended Nick Cheung’s last concert

Now that I’ve seen Jacky Cheung, I’ve officially attended concerts for two of the Sky Kings. That’s two down, and two to go. Who are the remaining two? Well, there’s this guy:

He’s been at this all morning

And this guy:

Aaron Kwok and a, uh, Golden Horse

I’m actually betting that Mr. Golden Horse will be the next one I see. After all, Aaron Kwok does have a concert going on right now in Hong Kong. Maybe I’ll luck into some tickets, and hopefully he won’t wear something like this:

Insert your own caption here

By the way, we just had Valentine’s Day here in Hong Kong. Two years ago on Valentine’s Day, I went and hung out with a friend - who we’ll call Mr. G - in Lan Kwai Fong. We went to a party attended by other single people who had no Valentine’s Day dates. I actually didn’t want to go, but I went as his wingman. I still paid for my own drinks.

The highlight of the evening came when he introduced me to a pretty girl who worked in Central. Mr. G said to her, “This guy runs a famous website! It’s all about Hong Kong movies!”

“Really,” she said. “About Hong Kong movies?”

“Yep,” was my reply. My beer was warm.

She arched an eyebrow. “But Hong Kong movies are shit.”

Kenichi Matsuyama will tell you how I felt:

“You suck, Kozo.”

Being single is tough.

A final dating tip for all the guys. If you want to do well with the ladies, you need one of these:

Just learn how to repair it yourself.

Photo credits: Yahoo HK, Apple Daily, a borrowed digital camera, and my hard drive.

I still have no idea what to do with this blog…so here’s some more wax people to look at. It could be all that we do around here.

In our last blog entry, we mentioned that Andy Lau is the most-harassed wax figure at Madame Tussauds, meaning more people want to touch him than Michelle Yeoh, Yao Ming, Bruce Lee, Lee Ka-Sing and Hitler. But what happens to the other wax figures when nobody’s looking?

Are people harassing one or perhaps both of the Wax Twins?

Better than any scene
in Twins Mission

Does Janice harass herself?

And what exactly has Janice
done to get her own wax figure?

Is Wax Jackie jealous of Wax Andy?

“I refuse to be harassed less than Andy Lau.”

Does Cecilia Cheung get angry that Wax Nic gets harassed?

After Cecilia found out, she arranged
for both this girl’s arms to be broken.

None of the above celebs can hold a candle to Wax Andy’s popularity, which may say a lot about how much people actually like the real Andy Lau. Honestly, Andy Lau deserves his massive popularity; he works very, very hard at being Hong Kong’s top entertainer, and even works when he doesn’t have to.

For example, I took this picture of a friend with Andy Lau while he was bowling a fine game in Tai Kok Tsui:

“I’m kicking ass on the lanes today!
…yeah, I’ll pose for a photo with you.”

The man takes both his bowling and his fans seriously, and never seems given to fits of pique or celebrity attitude. He’s Andy Lau 24/7 - a duty we lesser mortals could probably never handle. After taking the above photo, I declined to have my own picture taken with Andy Lau because he had enough adoring fans looking for photo ops and autographs. Somehow I didn’t feel the need to bother him while he was attempting a seven-ten split. Better to let him enjoy his time on the lanes without yet another fan wanting a piece of him.

Besides, I panned All About Love, and constantly make fun of his CYMA watch ads, so I would feel embarrassed about meeting Andy Lau.

“Buy a CYMA watch! Go on, buy one!”

Meanwhile, a fan just stole Wax Andy’s CYMA watch, which is why he’s got his hand in his pocket.

“The fan also stole my hand.”

Poor Wax Andy.

While I’m on vacation in Los Angeles and trying to figure out what to do with this new blog, here’s some fun and rather disurbing news from Hong Kong. It’s now two weeks old, but like everything else around here, our ability to report - or skewer - news is rather slow.

As reported by Mingpao.com (via Yahoo! Hong Kong), Andy Lau has been sexually harassed for years. The perpetrators: tourists who visit Hong Kong to feel up his fake body at Madame Tussaud’s House of Embalmed Corpses, er, Wax Museum. Apparently, visitors have been getting a mite too close to the Infernal Affairs-themed Andy doll in order to touch, nibble, or finger various parts of his fake body.

Too much sexual harassment can mummify you. 

There have also been reports of visitors unzipping his pants, or even reaching into them - hopefully because they’re professionals paid to check out the quality of the wax. Regardless of these individuals’ skills at wax Q.C., workers at the museum state that they have to check the statue at the end of each day to see if Wax Andy is still in one piece. Physically, that is. Psychologically, there may be no hope for Wax Andy, or for real Andy once he gets a load of his wax twin’s adventures.

A look at some of the damage to Wax Andy:

Superglue would probably help.

And how did this happen?

This nose can tell stories that
would shock and disturb you.

2R recently made their own close inspection of Wax Andy and came up with this evaluation:

Andy Lau’s reaction:

“I call shenanigans! It’s not supposed to be anatomically correct!”

Note: everything except for Andy Lau’s reaction and the bit with 2R is totally true. Maybe next time I’ll come up with a real blog entry.