Saturday 1 April 2017

Who was this lady?

Update 24 August 2017: Sally Chan has confirmed that the lady in question was indeed Barbara Yung. Sally scanned the photo from a microfilm a while ago. Thanks, Sally!



A few months ago, Cynthia sent me some photos of Michael Miu and Barbara Yung, many of them I had never seen. One of them was the photo above that I eventually used in the "In the Rain" MV.  Cynthia labelled the photo as an MB photo, hence I took it that the woman on Michael's lap was Barbara. However, I always had my doubts about the photo, because the scan quality is so low. Plus, the woman could very well be Jaime.

Then, a few days ago, a new reader Nelly contacted me and talked about some MB things, including this photo. I asked Nelly if she was sure that the woman was Barbara, and Nelly said she was certain. The woman had a smile diagnostic of Barbara. Then I asked Hannah too, and Hannah also said she thought the woman was Barbara. Since I was still in doubt, I did a simple experiment with the photo to see if the woman was Barbara... or Jaime.



What I originally did was, as Nelly did, just tilted the photo such that the woman's profile was straight. However, I was still not convinced she was Barbara. Then, last night I happened to watch Chor Lau Heung Ep 19 when Fell Cut left Siu Ching in the temple for Chor tai-gor to find. Before Fell Cut left Siu Ching, back in the village, SC asked Fell Cut to bring some firewoods, and she was rather merry about it. Below are the screen caps of her laughter.




I then combined the two screen caps with the scan photo as follows:



That woman started to look like Barbara. However, to eliminate the possibility that she was Jaime, I had to combine the photo with Jaime's side profile.  I then remember that I did have her screen shots with Michael in Yang's Saga (1985). Hence... this composite below:

First row: Barbara (in CLH'84), Second row: Jaime (Yang's Saga)

Now it's clearer to me that the woman was indeed Barbara. Jaime's chin is not as pronounced as Barbara's. Babs had more definition on her chin, a distance between her chin and her neck, if that makes sense. Also, Barbara's jaws were more defined than Jaime’s. Jaime's photo on the right-hand side (where she was holding a knife) showed the difference between her jaw and chin profile with those of Barbara's (above Jaime's photo).

Nelly, you were correct too about Barbara’s smile (thanks a lot, anyway!). The woman on Michael's lap showed distinctive teeth, which reminded me of Barbara’s rabbit teeth (see Barbara's Siu Ching screen shot on the left side). Actually, the woman's teeth was indeed diagnostic of Barbara's feature...

Now that I'm more certain that the woman on Michael's lap was Barbara, a better way to glue the conclusion would be to have the original article of that scan. I take it that it was a scan from a newspaper article...

Also, this conclusion then begs another question: what was the setting around Michael and Barbara back then? They indeed looked too cozy to be just friends...


10 comments:

Kimberly said...

It took me A LONG time to figure out what "OTP" was. But they're my OTP lol. I ship them.

Icha said...

LOL! You're too funny!

Anonymous said...

Wow Icha!! What a thorough investigation of this picture!!! I am amazed that you did screen shots to compare both B & J. You are a very devoted MB fan!!!

Icha said...

Thank you, Nelly! This is post was definitely because of our discussion... so I truly appreciate your visits!

Will reply to your email later today, thanks for that.

Anonymous said...

This picture clipping is actually from me. It was copied and passed from the one to another one to another one......etc. It was scanned from microfilm newspapers. That's why it is not clear. Yes, it is Barbara.

Icha said...

Oh WOW!! Thanks a lot!

Could you kindly identify yourself so that I can properly acknowledge you as the source? If possible, could you also identify the original magazine as the original source?

many thanks,
Icha

Anonymous said...

Sorry for the late reply. It's sally Chan. I cannot remember which one: Zaobao or Wanbao. It had been many years ago. Like in 1998 or 1999.

Icha said...

No worries. I've added your name on the top of the post. Since the magazine source is uncertain, I'll refrain from mentioning it in the post until we have more confirmation, if any. Thanks a lot!

Anonymous said...

I stumbled across your blog a few nights ago and now it is one of my favorite blog to visit. I grew up watching TVB series, and was captivated by many of them. However, I was especially captivated by MB. I first saw them in LOCH and was SO DISAPPOINTED that they weren't a pair. I liked Felix but he and Barbara chemistry wasn't impressionable. Then CLH came and I fell in love with this series from the start. I honestly love everything about this series from the storyline, characters, costumes and martial arts. This was one of the best TVB production without the technology that we have today. As young as I was watching CLH, I picked up on the amazing chemistry MB had (I didn't even know they were paired in other series prior to CLH until 5-6 years ago!). No other pairing had come close to MB. I know LOCH 1983 is TVB masterpiece and loved by millions, but in my opinion CLH should also go down in history as a timeless masterpiece as well for it's production value. I lost count of how many times I visit the series. I think I re-watch it every two-three years and seem to never grow tired of it. It never fails that when I'm near the last episode, I get sad because there's no more MB. Hence I go looking for MB on the web. Like many of their fans, I wished MB had been a romantic pair in real life and they had a happy ending. I imagine they would had fate given them a chance, but I guess we'll never know the truth of the depth of their relationship. I guess this is why I re-visit their series (I now own all their series together) so often. What fate couldn't give them in real life, at least we have them together; frozen in the lives of the characters they portrayed. And in CLH they sailed away together.

Icha said...

Hi Anon, my apologies for the very late approval of your comment; I didn't mean to neglect it. It's just I was on leave when you left the comment, and I didn't check my blogs when I was away...

But yes I hear you! I think CLH should be a classic, and it is indeed a classic. It's just often shadowed by LOCH, which I think is a good work... but I prefer CLH in general. Yes, perhaps it's because of MB that I prefer CLH, but I think CLH 1984 also has very interesting storylines.

Interesting. You said that you watched MB first in LOCH, but you were already an MB fan, hence you were disappointed they were not paired there. So, how did you love MB in the first place, if not through LOCH? Given that LOCH was the first MB work you watched, I mean...