LIKE other aficionados of Chinese martial arts, Gerard Lee Ming-wai is a fan of Bruce Lee, with videotapes at home of the legendary kung fu fighter, along with those of his successors, Jet Lee and Jackie Chan.
'When I was a kid, all I heard about was Bruce Lee. He was someone to look up to, to aspire to,' says the 31-year-old British Chinese who has studied martial arts for more than 12 years.
'Being Chinese, it was neat seeing the small Chinese guys winning in the movies.' While Chinese martial arts have long graced the big screen, and existed even longer in real life, finding a school in Hong Kong is not always easy.
A Canadian Chinese woman who recently arrived in Hong Kong to work for the summer with an accounting firm, was disappointed when she started her search.
'I looked under 'martial arts' in the Yellow Pages and there was only one listing,' she says.
Neil Tan, a 28-year-old American Chinese working as a strategic planning manager for an office product company, says when he started his research for schools at a kung fu supplies store, there were advertisements on the wall.
'But most of them were fly-by-night operations. It would be some expat guy who wanted to teach for a year before flying off to Bali or something like that,' he says.
