Bruce Lee buffs up beaut

EVERYWHERE you go in Hong Kong there is a Bruce Lee connection. No surprise then that the city runs tours tracing sites he made famous.

BRUCE Lee escaped US military service during the Vietnam War because of an undescended testicle.

He might have overdosed on the aphrodisiac Spanish Fly or been killed by a Shaolin monk's delayed death touch. More likely he died as an allergy to painkillers taken with cannabis which he preferred to eat rather than smoke.

You learn such things on the new Bruce Lee Footsteps Tour of Hong Kong.

Recognising his tourism value, the city has begun tours tracing the sites the martial arts legend made famous.

It takes in the Miramar Hotel where producer Raymond Chow and Australian actor George Lazenby waited for him on the evening of his death during Typhoon Dorothy and the Queen Elizabeth Hospital on Gascoigne Road where he was pronounced dead.

It also includes the funeral parlour on Maple St, Kowloon, which was mobbed by fans when he lay in state in a bronze coffin.

Also featured are La Salle Catholic School which he attended in 1952 and Saint Xavier's School where he studied in 1958 and 1959.

His many homes can be visited: 218 Nathan Rd, now a shopping mall; 2 Man Wan Rd; 14 Cumberland Place; and where he died – 67 Beacon Hill Rd, now the Romantic Love Hotel and brothel.

There's also King's Park where he practised and perfected his martial skills and honed his extraordinary athleticism.

You can visit the site of his first business office, too.

Everywhere you go in Hong Kong there is a Bruce Lee connection. Aberdeen Harbour, for instance, was the meeting place for Lee, Williams and Roper in Enter The Dragon. This is where they got on the boat to go to Hans island.

Also, the Red Pepper Restaurant at 7 Lan Fong Rd, Causeway Bay, was Dr Land's headquarters in Game of Death.

The car park on the top of the Ocean terminal off Canton Rd is where he did some of his most famous publicity shots. Cox Rd Children's Playground is another place he posed for promotional photos.

Queens Cinema, located at 31 Queens Rd Central, Central District, is where films Big Boss and Way of the Dragon premiered.

Diamond Hill and Hammer Hill Rd is the location of the fight in Enter The Dragon that featured Angela Mao Ying. This is also the original site of Golden Harvest Studios. You can even visit his favourite eating place – Osaka Japanese Restaurant.

Or take the hydrofoil to Macao to see the Jardin Luis De Cameos with the original gates used in Fist of Fury.

Thirty-three years after his death at the age of 32, Bruce Lee's popularity is greater than ever. He has become one of the most immediately recognisable movie stars with an image as widespread and familiar as Marilyn Monroe's.

"He is an icon not only of martial arts but the whole Hong Kong film industry, and also the Far East in general – his fan base is worldwide," says Bruce Lee Fan Club's chairman Wong Yiu-Keung.

To celebrate what would have been his 66th birthday, Hong Kong recently unveiled a 2.5-metre bronze statue of the high-kicking hero. Fittingly, it is on the Avenue of Stars in Tsim Sha Tsui, overlooking Victoria Harbour and the famous skyscraper skyline and scene of the nightly laser show.

The $100,000 work was sculpted by Professor Cao Cheng-En and the design was chosen on an Internet poll by 5700 Bruce Lee fans.

Every day tourists queue to have their photograph digitally taken beside 'The Star of the Century'. Wong continues: "We have been asking for Bruce to be commemorated in this way for a long time. He opened the way for people like Jackie Chan (who appeared in two Lee films) and Jet Li.

"He made Hong Kong famous around the world. There was a statue already in Mostra in Bosnia where he is seen as a powerful symbol for battling prejudice and ethnic division. At last Hong Kong's favourite son has been recognised. And immortalised."

Wong runs a small museum and souvenir shop stocking everything from Lee wristwatches to an extensive research library.

"We even sell Bruce Lee masks for people who want to go to parties and pretend to be him.

"He is more than just a cult figure; he was a martial arts pioneer and innovator. Although he had his faults and his problems, he achieved a great deal – notably popularising kung fu in the West and getting Asian actors and actresses taken seriously for the first time in world cinema.

"Through his achievements and philosophies he inspires people to this day," Wong says.

Lee was actually born in San Francisco, the son of a famous Cantonese opera comedian, Lee Hoi-Chuen. He made 28 films as a child actor and made his first appearance in front of the cameras as a baby in The Golden Gate Girl.

He also appeared in such US TV shows as Longstreet and The Green Hornet.

He choreographed the fight scenes in Dean Martin's spoof James Bond movie The Wrecking Crew.

Lee made only 4 1/2 martial arts films between 1971 and 1973 – Big Boss, Fist of Fury, The Way of the Dragon, Enter The Dragon (which he wrote and directed) and Game of Death, which was completed after his death.

He married Linda Lee Caldwell in 1964 and died on July 29, 1973, at the apartment of his mistress, the Taiwanese actress Betty Ting Pei.

His son, Brandon, died on the set of The Crow in 1994. Lee is buried in the Lake View Cemetery in Seattle.

Lee, the guides will tell you, was more than high jumps and one finger push-ups. He was more than a six pack.

Bruce was more than buff. He was the first to teach kung fu to the non-Chinese. He outgrossed Steve McQueen at his prime. He broke Chinese films into the international market.

The Little Red Dragon was a great man. And now he is a legend.