PETALING JAYA, May 14 — TVB actor Vincent Lam did not grow up surrounded by the glitz and glamour of show business.
In fact, the 55-year-old had humble beginnings as a teenager helping out his mother with cleaning jobs after his father passed away, Ming Pao Weekly reported.
“Every day, I would follow her on her job before school began, mainly to clubs and billiard parlours.
“She would clean the floors, and I would clean areas that required climbing up and down,” he said based on translation by Jayne Stars.
Rolling up his sleeves at a young age to keep the family afloat ended up forming a strong bond between the actor and his mother.
“These times of suffering made us exceptionally close. I got used to listening to Mom, and hardly talked back to her,” he said.
Lam, the youngest child with three brothers and one sister, said he also cleaned taxis and worked in dim sum restaurants to put food on the table for his family.
Known for portraying bad guys on the small screen, Lam said he never had the opportunity to work out at the gym as a young actor in the industry.
Instead, he built his muscles working as a garage apprentice with his older brother where he waxed and polished cars.
Lam’s first foray into acting was being an extra on ATV’s Gone with the Wind, giving him the chance to share a set with the late Hong Kong acting veteran Leslie Cheung.
Despite living in one of the most expensive cities in the world, Lam had his heart set on giving more than half of his salary from his first job to his mother.
“Back then I would definitely set aside a sum for property and family expenses before giving myself anything.
“I got HK$1,200 (RM638) each month at my first job; HK$1,000 (RM531) would go to my mom and HK$200 (RM106) would be for myself.”
His mother is now 90 years old and has been living in a nursing home ever since she started suffering memory problems a few years ago.
Lam continues to carve out time to be with her while juggling his busy acting schedule and added that he has a renewed sense of appreciation for the woman who raised him.
“I have to keep talking to her about the past: Which floor did we live on at our old place? Who are the people we lived with?
“When I don’t have work, I help massage her in the afternoons and joke with her. Seeing her happy makes me happy too.
“Sometimes she would touch my forehead, this makes me very touched as our lives were hard in the past and she did not even have the luxury of time to touch my head.
“I’m afraid of losing this feeling one day so I appreciate it now.”
