She says she prefers the quiet life, but former actress Mary Jean Reimer is back in the media spotlight fighting a cause that is close to her heart
VIVIENNE CHOWvivienne.chow@scmp.com
PUBLISHED : Monday, 26 October, 2015, 12:00am
UPDATED : Monday, 26 October, 2015, 12:00am
Mary Jean Reimer acts out of conscience.
The legendary actress-turned-lawyer says she has entered the spotlight again simply so she can sleep easy at night. In doing so she has put herself in the eye of another media storm.
"I'm a retired person, a housewife. I'm not fighting for anything. I'm not running for Legco or becoming a politician," says Reimer. "But can I walk away from this fraud? I can't do that."
How it started: Director accuses chief nun of 'sham marriage, embezzlement' in Hong Kong monastery
Reimer is referring to the recent controversial case of Sik Chi Ding, the abbess of Ting Wai Monastery in Tai Po, who allegedly pocketed millions in donations and is accused of two sham marriages with mainland monks.
Reimer feels responsible for what happened and has played a modern day Sherlock Holmes in the latest episode of her colourful life, seeking to expose dirt swept under Buddhist robes and expose a woman she had initially tried to help.
"I believe that it's a blessing to become a holy person, and one should cherish that," says the 51-year-old. "It's the worst nightmare. I don't feel angry. I'm feeling very sad instead. It's a sad situation. I feel sorry for her."
It all began out of Reimer's good heart.
Having learned in February about the adverse conditions and financial difficulties facing the 90-year-old monastery, she decided to rally support from Buddhists and the public and waged a fundraising campaign to save it from falling apart.
READ MORE: Chief nun and mainland Chinese monk arrested amid claims of marriage scam and embezzlement in Hong Kong monastery probe
Reimer recalls the sight of the monastery when she visited. "It was in a very bad state. The ceilings were collapsing. The altar where ceremonies were supposed to be conducted had a big hole in it," she says. "I had never heard of any religious establishment being so run down as this."
Worse still, the monastery could not raise funds through hosting ceremonies for the masses because of noise complaints from neighbours, Reimer says. "I'm just a simple person giving my good heart."
Reimer subsequently waged a fundraising campaign and her fame convinced many to support the cause - she is no ordinary housewife, as she claims to be.
READ MORE: Row over management of Hong Kong monastery sparks calls for rethink of plan to scrap Chinese temples law
She might have declined to answer questions concerning her personal history but her exploits have made her an urban legend in Chinese communities around the world.
Born in 1964, Reimer is better known as Yung Ching-ching - as she was called aged 16 when she shot to fame as the new Shaw Brothers screen goddess, starring opposite Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing and Danny Chan Pak-keung in the 1980 film Encore. She went on to star in martial arts fantasies including Little Dragon Maiden, also opposite Cheung, and Holy Flame of the Martial World (1983).
She shocked fans when she abruptly quit showbiz in 1984 to marry kung fu legend and film director Lau Kar-leung, who was 30 years her senior.
The couple had two daughters but Reimer did not settle for the role of a Stepford Wife. She reinvented herself as a multitalented modern day career woman with a profile that was the envy of many: a television and radio show host, a top insurance consultant, a best-selling author and a lawyer running her own legal firm. Recently it was reported that she has been dating Sean Hotung, son of billionaire philanthropist Eric Hotung.
While focusing on developing her career in law, the mysterious death of lawyer Ken Lim Keng-yip brought her back into the limelight in 2001.
Lim, a litigation partner and solicitor at Johnson Stokes & Master, accidentally fell from the seventh-floor flat of Reimer, who was a trainee at the firm at the time. It was reported that Lau had rung the doorbell and Lim climbed out a window, stood on a ledge but lost his balance and fell on to a podium.
The shocking case, however, did not prove to be an obstacle to Reimer's determination in the legal field.
She became a solicitor who dared to speak out. Shortly after Lau died in 2013, Reimer set up a charity in Lau's name to help struggling martial artists and actors. She appealed to Shaw Brothers Studio's Mona Fong, wife of studio founder Run Run Shaw for between HK$5 million and HK$10 million in bonuses from overseas box office takings stretching back more than three decades that she claimed was owed her late husband.
READ MORE: Shaw studio 'owes late kung fu star millions'
"Master Lau was a leader in a number of strikes, causing the Shaw Brothers Studio - which was focusing on martial arts films at the time - to suspend production [...] This story teaches us that there's a price for social justice, but it is worth it for a greater cause," she wrote in one social media post at the time.
So it was hardly a surprise to see Reimer throwing herself into a campaign to revive the rundown monastery. She proposed turning it into a meditation centre that would allow to monastery to function while avoiding noise complaints.
She and other volunteers organised a fundraising campaign, including a crowd-funding project on website FringeBacker at the end of June to raise funds to restore the monastery's run-down structure. She also serves on the board of directors of the monastery.
By the end of September, it had raised more than HK$1.3 million from 737 donors. It was the second largest online crowd-funded campaign in Hong Kong, according to the website. Within six months, some HK$5 million had been raised.
Just when there appeared to be light at the end of the tunnel, Reimer discovered something had gone very wrong.
"[Sik Chi Ding] doesn't pray. She doesn't turn the lights on for the Buddha, claiming to save electricity bills. But she turns air-conditioning on for herself," says Reimer.
Reimer and other volunteers offered help, hoping to persuade her to change and practise Buddhism in a proper way. They even signed up Chi Ding for six months' training with a Buddhist institute in Taiwan so she could learn everything all over again.
READ MORE: Hong Kong Buddhist Association distances itself from monastery in alleged marriage-for-residency scam
But Reimer says she discovered that the nun had transferred the donations from an account designated for maintenance funds to another account under her control. "I was very upset. That was no difference from stealing money."
Reimer and other volunteers confronted the nun in July. She paid back HK$400,000, cancelled the Taiwan trip - and tried to remove Reimer from the board.
Reimer also alleged that the abbess had admitted that she had married twice in order to help two mainland monks secure permanent Hong Kong residency. Both monks were affiliated with Po Lin Monastery on Lantau Island.
She confronted Po Lin Monastery's abbot, Sik Chi Wai, president of the Hong Kong Buddhist Association. "The answer I got was: 'if you are a Buddhist, stay out of it.' I could never imagine this," she says.
But Reimer will not stay out of it. She says she has received donations from many, including tiny sums from old people who have few savings. She even received a donation of HK$80,000 from someone shortly before she died.
"It was her life savings. She made the donation from her deathbed before she died."
Although Chi Ding and a monk, Ru Zhi, were arrested by the Immigration Department amid allegations they were involved in a bogus marriage last week, the curious case of Ting Wai Monastery has exposed the lack of an effective monitoring system for the management of Chinese temples.
On the day Chi Ding was arrested, she issued a statement saying she had reported the matter to police.
"I will not speculate on the motives behind Ms Reimer's recent acts," she wrote.
"The matter has been passed to my lawyer and I will not comment further."
Reimer, on the other hand, is preparing for a court case.
"I have to clear my conscience," she says. "I know what I'm going to face. I have responsibility for the donations, a duty to these people."
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/education-community/article/1871932/bad-karma-screen-goddess-returns-lurid-tale
