[Ta Kung Pao]

Ron Ng held an autograph session yesterday for his sponsors and around two hundred fans lined up outside the shop to see him, with the female fans at the front of the line arriving at 7am to queue, holding a group of bunch of flowers and Ron's favourite astroboy character to present to him. Other fans also gave him flowers and Ron was so busy receiving all these gifts.

There was a little chaos at yesterday's signing because the fans wanting to have a photo with their idol pushed each other about, but luckily security was on hand to keep order. Ron was rather shy about his fans warmth to him, just replying politely "Thank you" to each fan who gave him a gift. He indicated that beforehand, he was worried that his signing session would just see three or four people and he was only relieved when he arrived to see such a crowd. He felt sorry for the fans who were queuing in such harsh conditions and in order to satisfy their wishes, the autograph session went on for an hour.

Also, Ron's series "Twin of Brothers" achieved average ratings of 28 points last week and he felt that it could get better. Talking of Dayo Wong and Ada Choi's pledges during the celebratory dinner for "To Catch the Uncatchable", where Ada suggested Dayo should get married if the show hit forty points, Ron laughs and says: "I don't have a girlfriend yet and have not saved enough to start a home and family, so I daren't make such rash promises. what if the show hit fifty, what would I do?" However, he does promise that if the show's ratings hit 36 or 36 points, he will take the crew out for dinner.

http://www.takungpao.com/news/2004-8-1/UL-289044.htm



[Ta Kung Pao Special Report - San San]

2004 Miss Chinese International Linda Chung has followed in the footsteps of Bernice Liu and stayed in Hong Kong to further her career after returning from Canada and is now being heavily promoted by TVB. With no acting experience previously, her first series has been in the highly rated "Virtues of Harmony" and this will have a great impact on her popularity, so little wonder that in her short career so far, there have been many invitations for her to take part in openings and advertisements.

As for joining the crew of "Virtues", Linda says happily: "As each actor has their own style, I have learned a lot from them all and they are great fun, so I am very happy filming, especially with Albert Lo, who has a lot of scenes with me and he has given me a lot of tips." As the winner of Miss Chinese International, Linda's beauty is undisputed, but her voice is rather weak and has been described as 'Baby Chick Voice', if she does not change this, then it will affect her future development. To this, she understands and she has been practicing by reading out newspapers and her scripts aloud to try and train her voice.

Born and brought up in Canada, Linda's family are all still over there and she only returned to Hong Kong for the first time to take part in the beauty pageant. Moving away from her family to be on her own in Hong Kong, she must have a goal that she wants to achieve, but she says that she does not and has never thought about being a female lead at TVB. She says: "I am just following my interest by entering showbiz and I would like to try a lot of new things to add some colour to my life. I hope that the audience will like me!" As for stars that she likes, there are many as she has loved watching television since she was very young, even classing as a TV fan, so the stars she likes are mainly from a TV background, such as Sean Lau, Ada Choi and Stephen Chow. She admires them all for their acting ability.

Remembering when she took part in the MCI competition, she revealed that her two ambitions were to enter the performance industry or the education sector. Now that she has chosen one of them, why give up the teaching? She says: "As I had the opportunity to work in front of the camera, then I chose this path, but I would still really like to be a teacher because this has been my wish since I entered kindergarten. Maybe my own teachers were very caring and friendly and there is also an element of respect for you as a teacher as the students will follow your instructions on one command." If she ever gets the opportunity to enter the teaching profession, Linda would like to teach primary school because kindergarten kids are too young and more difficult to teach and the she is afraid that she would not be able to control secondary kids. Primary school children are very innocent with simple thoughts and she feels that if they can be taught well from an early age, then they will have a great benefit.

With Linda's love for teaching, then she must love children a lot. She admts this, saying: "Yes, I do love children, so I will definitely not get married later because I don't want to be an older mother. I am now 22 and I hope to get married at around 26 years old. (How many children will you have?) Four! The best would be two girls and two boys."

At the moment, Linda is alone in Hong Kong, does she get homesick? She smiles: "Not really, because my mother was here with me for a while earlier and although she has now returned to Canada, the company has arranged for Carlene Aguilar to come and live with me. As we both knew each other from MCI, we keep each other company." It turns out that Linda's home has been provided for her by TVB, so she has to live together with Carlene. As for not having any elders around to look after her, is she eating fast food for every meal? She says: "Actually, my mother taught me to cook before she left, but just simple things like macaroni, spaghetti, boiling vegetables and frying eggs. You can still get full on simple food though." Linda's favourite is making soup, especially as you can buy prepacked soup ingredients from the supermarket that make the process very simple, so she does not go without the nutritional soup.

http://www.takungpao.com/news/2004-8-1/UL-289035.htm



[Ta Kung Pao]

This year's "Anti-crime Heroes Challenge" show was filming in TVB City yesterday and was aired yesterday evening. Stars appearing on the show included Kelly Chen, Andy Hui, Edmond Leung, Alex Fong (Lik San), Shine, Cookies, Don Li and Wilfred Lau. Hosting the show were Shek Sau, Winnie Yeung and Ellesmere Choy.

As there has been some serious drug-related incidents in the showbiz world recently, The Chief of Police Yam Tat Wing has indicated that in order to give out the wrong message to the young people, then only stars with very positive and healthy images were to appear in this show.

Edmond Leung says that he knows that the producers were very careful about selecting the guests for this show and were even more stringent than before, so many stars had no chance in taking part. As for who these people were, he was not prepared to reveal, but joked: "Only those with a clean background are allowed to take part in the show, but this is the right thing to do because the show promotes the fight against crime and involves members of the Junior Police Call, then the stars taking part must give a positive message." When asked if he was a healthy star, Edmond laughs that of course he is and reveals that he does take part in many community projects and he has many commemorative plaques from these. With reports suggesting that he has not given up drinking and smoking, he says with some embarrassment that he is trying his best. He had thought about giving up smoking before, but it was unsuccessful because he is used to using cigarettes to keep him awake when he is working at night.

Kelly was also asked if she had been though a rigorous selection to appear on the show and she said: "I am very happy that since entering showbiz, I am able to take part in such a big show every year. As for the problem at the moment with juvenile crime, I feel that we should give them a chance to change their ways. (Are there stars who have been blacklisted and unable to appear in these healthy positive shows?) I have not heard of this." As for Edmond's suggestion that only those with clean lifestyles have been chosen to perform, does Kelly agree? She thinks a little before saying: "I think it should be those stars who are able to bring out the most positive message to the young people and be able to lead by example."

Also, Shine have appeared in this show for the second year running and in response to the selection process, Tin Yau replies: "I think for the organisers to choose us, it is the result of rigorous selection. They have their ways of doing things and we will just be ourselves. (Do you fall into the category of 'anti-crime stars'?) Of course! At least we don't do anything illegal." As for earlier magazine reports that suggested they used drugs, does appearing on the show help them quash these rumours? Shine admit that this does help to prove their innocence and believe that justice will be done.

Also, Shine and Roy Chow have known each other for two years and in response to Roy's drug problem after meeting with bad friends, Tin Yau indicates that Roy has never used drugs in their presence and has not tried to push it to them. He says: "We did not know at all that he used drugs, but he does know a lot of friends that we don't know."

http://www.takungpao.com/news/2004-8-1/UL-289048.htm



[Ta Kung Pao]

Niki Chow and Patrick Tang took part in a promotional event for "Guide Dog Little Q" to raise money for the Hong Kong Society for the Protection of Animals and the organisers had arranged for some trained dogs to do tricks, attracting the applause from the audience. When one little poodle did a handstand, Niki was very happy and it turned out that this dog was also called Nikki, making her laugh. Niki laughs that this was the first time she had met with a dog that had the same name as her and it was very amusing. She has some dogs herself and would like to take them to be trained so that they do not keep losing their temper.

Patrick also has a poodle, but he says his knowledge about dogs is lacking and he is currently looking for a partner for his dog to mate with. Earlier whilst filming in Athens, his group were accused of upsetting the gods in the temple, but Patrick insist that they did not do anything out of the ordinary or disrepectful whilst filming in the temple and this had all been a misunderstanding. As the curator in the temple was very upset, they were instructed to stop filming very shortly after they started and Patrick says that they do have the ultimate respect for every place they go to and will not cause trouble.

Also, Roy Chow has been sentenced to 18 months counselling, but Patrick says he has not yet been able to contact him. He believes that after this incident, Roy will know what he should and should not do. Hearing that the judge had watched the film "Truth or Dare", Patrick found this rather funny and said: "When Roy heard this, he must have found it amusing too!"

http://www.takungpao.com/news/2004-8-1/UL-289042.htm
For those who do not know what "Truth or Dare" is:
http://www.lovehkfilm.com/reviews/truth_or_dare.htm