‘Bruce Lee of Afghanistan’: lookalike kung fu king of Kabul forced to flee Taliban regime and dreams of Hong Kong visit
- 29-year-old Afghan refugee Abbas Alizada who shot to fame thanks to his similar looks to Hong Kong martial arts icon now lives in the United Kingdom
- The actor and impersonator hopes that one day he will be able to visit Hong Kong and the statue of his idol
Abbas Alizada saw his first Bruce Lee movie as an eight-year-old in Afghanistan.
But watching the Hong Kong action star in hits such as Fist of Fury, The Big Boss and Alizada’s favourite, Enter the Dragon, was dangerous.
Under the Taliban – the hardline Islamic regime that ruled Afghanistan at the time – television, music and cinema were banned.
“If caught I would have been punished,” said Alizada, now 29, via video call from the British city of Manchester where he lives with his wife and two young boys.
“People were beaten and had their hands and feet chopped off.”
But Alizada’s connection to Lee did not stop at a love for martial arts and his movies.
In 2014, Alizada shot to social media fame after friends posted photos of him on Facebook. His striking resemblance to Lee did not go unnoticed.
“I am Afghanistan’s Bruce Lee,” he said. “That’s what people called me ... I was getting recognised in the street.”
Movie roles, television appearances and celebrity tours of the region rolled in. Hollywood even reached out and offered him a role, although contract details are still being negotiated.
In his home outside the capital Kabul, Alizada spent hours practising in a makeshift gym, the walls lined with posters of his martial arts hero. Like Lee, he was also nifty with nunchucks.
But in August 2021, Alizada’s world imploded when the Taliban recaptured Kabul. Movie stars and musicians were again in danger.
The looks that catapulted Alizada to stardom now made him a target. So did his ethnicity.
Alizada is a member of the Hazara group, one of Afghanistan’s largest ethnic minority groups that has long faced violence and discrimination.
“I was in danger – my training partner was killed by the Taliban.”
He also feared for his wife who holds a brown belt in karate. “For women and girls life was difficult.”
Under the Taliban, women are banned from many jobs and denied access to public parks and gyms.
Girls cannot attend secondary schools. Just last week the restrictions on education were extended when the government banned women from universities.
A British charity, along with Alizada’s London-based lawyer Mahtab Aziz, helped Alizada and his family flee the war-torn country.
It was the start of a long and complicated process to bring him to the United Kingdom that included six months in Pakistan and time in Iran.
“When we fled my youngest boy was only 15 days old and didn’t have a passport,” he said. “In Pakistan we lived in small tents without beds. I was so stressed my hair fell out but you can see that it’s now thick and healthy.”
He arrived in Britain in November last year, and is getting back in shape with an intense training routine. “Four hours in the morning, four hours at night,” he said.
He is also finding work as a Bruce Lee impersonator. Perfecting martial arts skills – high kicks and back flips – gives him an edge.
“I can even do a two-fingered push-up,” he said of the difficult manoeuvre Bruce Lee was known for.
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Afghan martial artist looks just like his idol Bruce Lee
In another twist of fate, Alizada is being trained by Samuel Kwok, the Hong Kong-born, UK-based martial arts master who was taught by Ip Chun, the eldest son of Ip Man who taught Bruce Lee.
“Samuel Kwok is my sifu - it is a great privilege to work with him.”
Alizada’s manager, Hongkonger Howard Lee, a Kim Jong-un doppelganger who makes a living impersonating North Korea’s supreme leader, is also on the video call.
“I was in Australia recently and I asked an Afghan cab driver if he had heard of the Afghan Bruce Lee and he replied: ‘Of course! He is famous!’ The same scene played out in a cab in Germany,” said Lee.
Lee is seeking financial sponsorship to bring Alizada to Hong Kong, the city where Bruce Lee spent most of his life and died there in 1973 aged just 32.
“Visiting Hong Kong would be a dream come true. I want to see the Bruce Lee statue,” said Alizada of the 2.5-metre bronze replica of Lee that is a popular tourist attraction.
For the son of a mechanic, nothing is impossible.
“I’m the youngest of a big poor family: four brothers and three sisters,” said Alizada. “Only my father supported what I did.”
One day he hopes to return to Afghanistan.
“I love Kabul and I want my children to see their birth place,” he said. “I want to return when peace has returned … I believe the Taliban will be removed one day.”
