My Dance with Francis Ng & Ti Lung

Imagine my excitement of interviewing not one, but TWO heavyweight actors from Hong Kong! Then imagine how my face fell when I heard that I had to interview them in mandarin. Oh no!!!! I had learnt all my mandarin from the television and so I panicked! Thank goodness I was given a week's notice about this and started to brush up on my mandarin by speaking to everyone in mandarin (and irritating them with all my accents!)

The night before the red carpet and premiere gala, I was sweating over the questions and how to translate them into mandarin-I even stooped to calling my little cousin's mandarin tutor to help me-which was a good move since he translated most of what I would use.Come the Red Carpet day. I calmed my nerves by shopping. Yes, I walked around Vivo City, shopping and practicing my questions (I think people thought I was crazy mumbling to myself). When I finally met Yen, she gave me her input on the mandarin translation and we were good to go (I was still mumbling the questions in my head). Casts & guests started arrive in their 'assassin' outfits and I got a couple of English questions in and started to warm up. Then Francis and Ti Lung arrived, and all hell broke loose as all the fans were screaming; and reporters were fighting to get some time to interview these two actors. Ti Lung really dressed and looked like a big time mafia boss. Hehehe… Francis looked like he always looks on the screens-funny! I got my questions in (proud that I didn't really stumble on my mandarin) and we were whisked off to watch the premiere of One Last Dance.

The next day, I met Yen to make our way to Legends at Fort Canning for my one-on-one interview with Ti Lung & Francis Ng. After setting up and getting the final brief from Yen, it was time to interview Ti Lung first. He was very friendly, kept repeating my name over and over again (perhaps he likes it because his wife's name is also Ming Ming) and his mandarin was very very good! The part I remembered most about the interview was his love for Singaporean food. He listed all the food he ate, and when the interview was over, he asked us what else he hasn't tried and should try. Hehehe. Very down-to-earth actor and friendly at it!

Next up was Francis. He reminds me of Jim Carrey because when he walked into our little interview corner, he just kept making fun and jokes. His reaction to my first question gave me a shock-I told him that my boyfriend enjoyed his roles in Gu Wa Zhai, and he immediately said something like, “How can you ask me this question? How can MTV send someone with a boyfriend here? Go away! Find me a female reporter that's single and available!”. Then I realized he was joking. =p That's how cheeky and funny Francis is! The rest of the interview went ok, but Francis was not as fluent in mandarin as Ti lung so listening to his answers so I can lead to a next question were a bit more challenging.

All in all, it was such an interesting experience-I got to meet two great Hong Kong actors that were friendly and nice, I got to test my limits through interviewing them in Mandarin, and I got to watch a pretty cool show! Thanks Veron for this chance again; and to Yen and the camera crew (Richard, etc) for your patience and guidance. Throw this future-MTV-VJ some more challenges! (yes, here I go again day dreaming!)