Yammie Nam’s Tumultuous Love Life
Suffering serious mental conditions for years, 49-year-old Yammie Nam (藍潔瑛) recently admitted to getting raped in the Hong Kong film industry two decades ago. Her horrifying rape experience, as well as having to go through numerous traumatic love affairs, worsened Yammie’s already weak mental state. Experts say Yammie most likely developed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after the rape, and with her stubborn personality, her PTSD had only gotten worse over the years.
Raped by “Big Brother”
In a recent video interview conducted in Mandarin, Yammie briefly spoke about her rape experience, which occurred in Singapore. She admitted to “giving herself” to several men – two which were to her boyfriends. She said, “The first time was rape. It wasn’t something I wanted. The second time was to the first boy I liked.”
Yammie was invited by a “Big Brother” (dai gor) in the Hong Kong film industry to visit a movie set in Singapore. She was offered a free plane ticket and stayed at the same rented house as the man. One night, the man got drunk and stole the key to her room, raping Yammie. She did not report the incident to the police because she believed the man acted out of norm because he was drunk and that the incident would blow out of proportion. But the rape haunted her for years afterward.
Boyfriend Committed Suicide
Having gone through several suicide attempts, Yammie was admitted to numerous mental facilities in the past. She revealed that her first suicide attempt was after breaking up with one of her first boyfriends. “They didn’t care about me. I didn’t know where they went. They left! I attempted suicide. It was during New Year’s.”
In May 1986, Yammie’s DJ boyfriend of three years committed suicide. Two years later, Yammie began dating wealthy heir Cheng Kar Sing (鄭家成) and was planning to get married, but the couple broke apart after Cheng Kar Sing reportedly cheated on her with another woman. In a 2008 interview, Yammie’s A Chinese Odyssey <西遊記> costar Athena Chu (朱茵) revealed that former boyfriend Stephen Chow (周星馳) had cheated on her while they were shooting A Chinese Odyssey, and Yammie later admitted that she had visited Stephen’s house before. Yammie has also been linked with Vivian Chow’s (周慧敏) husband, Joe Nieh (倪震).
Spiraling into Mental Illness
Yammie, who debuted as a popular young actress in 1983, was one of TVB’s brightest stars. Yammie’s emotional trauma began in 1986, the year Yammie refused to sign a long-term management contract and was frozen by TVB. She attempted an unsuccessful career in Taiwan, and later signed with Willie Chan (陳自強), who represented Jackie Chan (成龍), Cherie Chung (鍾楚紅), and Maggie Cheung (張曼玉).
Her mental state reportedly worsened after returning to TVB to shoot drama The Greed of Man <大時代>, in which she portrayed a mentally-ill character. Though critically-acclaimed for her performance, Yammie was unable to get out of character and even confided to good friend Alan Tam (譚詠麟) that she was having auditory hallucinations. Her parents’ passing in 1995 and 1996 further contributed to Yammie’s declining psychological health. Her Caucasian boyfriend of a few years also mysteriously disappeared in 1996 and she contemplated suicide after his disappearance. After completing her A Chinese Odyssey obligations in 1996, Yammie retired from the entertainment industry.
Yammie briefly returned to the entertainment industry in 2002 to star in a film, but close friends of her noticed that she was still depressed and remembered her traumatic experiences in the past. In 2003, she briefly dated marketing manager Philip. He once confronted Yammie about her weak condition and tried to convince Yammie to seek help, but Yammie’s stubbornness fell through and refused his help, which ended their relationship.
In 2006, Yammie filed for bankruptcy. Industry friends Andy Lau (劉德華) and Eric Tsang (曾志偉) reached out a helping hand; Andy also once tried to lend Yammie $100,000 HKD, but she turned him down. Last month, a reporter contacted Yammie, but she quickly cut the reporter off, insisting that she does not want to be involved with the entertainment industry anymore.
Source: Next Magazine via ihktv.com
This article is written by Addy for JayneStars.com.
Dai Gor? Jackie? Nooooo.. who?
which movie dai gor in the ’80 has passed away? who knows? one of the late dai gor is tang kwong wing,but i dont believe he would do such things.
Didn’t she said one passed away one didn’t? Tang Kwong Wing? Wasn’t he more 70s than 80s?
yes,’70+’80. he was a righteous guy and the godbrother of lydia sum.
I hope it’s not him even though it’s true that audiences will never truly know what an actor is like in real life. But Alan Tang always struck me as a decent person in real life. He’s my favorite actor and it would make me sick if it’s him.
I also highly doubt that the ‘dai gor’ is Alan Tang, as he doesn’t come across to me as that type of person either. Besides, the definition of ‘movie industry dai gor’ is very broad — with the way the HK film industry has evolved over the past 3 decades, even some media mogul types who’ve never/rarely acted in a film or movie can be considered a ‘dai gor’.
And to be honest, some of the ‘speculations’ as to who the men are who raped Yammie are becoming very ridiculous (some of the names circulating on the Internet lately make no sense at all…sounds like some netizens are just jumping on the bandwagon and throwing names of people they don’t like out there just for the heck of it).
Hope Yammie finally gets the help she needs…and very soon too!
She should go to rehab & get recover as soon as possible.
There is still hope.. It’s never too late to seek help!
Chinese Odyssey – I think Athena Chu SAID that she walked in on Karen Mok (the blood on guitar wife of a german guy) and Chow Seng Chee.
Karen Mok then became his girlfriend and english tutor. CLASSY.
No, the person she walked in on was Sandra Ng and Chow Sing Chee. Athena was either on DoDo Cheng’s or some other popular talk show a few years back.
Serious? Sandra Ng?
No, I recall the 3rd party as Karen Mok.
“he blood on guitar wife of a german guy”
what does that mean?
Karen Mok’s music video was on this site last year – I just remember it as being incredibly pretentious and something about blood drops on a guitar and she’s married to some German guy.
All this recent media publicity, people gawking and whispering in front of her….is not helping! Might push her over the brink!
Maybe she need to hit rock bottom in order to bounce back to reality
that’s like saying she should reach Stage 4 cancer and have body parts amputated a la Saw to appreciate simply being alive – haha, I don’t think so.
Maybe she wants the publicity to make a comeback in entertainment.
Not being mean. Just hoping.
She apparently has now said that the reports were “falsified” –
http://www.malaysia-chronicle.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=203881:ex-top-hk-star-yammie-lam-says-rape-in-spore-report-was-falsified&Itemid=4#.UrkGwfvvllc
Looks like she seriously needs professional psychiatric help.
Why am i not even surprised?
my mother predicted that Kenny Wee and Lam Geet Ying would be secretly told to change their stories – that is VERY gangster and normal HK people would immediately make the connection that she has been threatened
We all know she has mental problems so that is not anything new. However, whether she truly made those claims about being raped or not, we do not know for sure unless there was an actual recording of that interview that they claimed she did. Otherwise, it can be the press adding in more salt and pepper into the mix.
Yep. They are not above doing that.
that is exactly the argument against the Comfort Women victims if Korea’s government hadn’t stepped up and spoken for them
Comfort women is totally different from this scenario. The justification was they volunteered to be bed fellow with the Japanese soldier. Who in their right mind will believe thousands of women and young girls voluntarily be raped by dozens of men a day and these women weren’t even Japanese.
Yammie herself now refuted her story. She is of 2 minds. How can any prosecution put her up as a credible witness? But those comfort women, they remember every details and was steadfast in their stories.
isn’t that predictable though? because gangsters are remorseless people – they are definitely going to send her a message to retract her statement. this is just going to confirm to the public that she is helpless, defenseless, penniless and NO ONE will protect her and the FACT that so many people have guessed the SAME “dai gor” who has a lawyer daughter means that they will reach out and remind her that they can move a pinky to take her out.
THANK YOU SO MUCH – this is a wonderful world – because no matter how RICH and lawyered up the bad guys are – there is NO EXCUSE for society to facilitate them, to embolden them by making them feel respected and socialized. I have a problem with third party bullies getting involved with my father’s gangster murderers as well so I understand that social acceptance and befriending to legitimize murderers very well. We even invited Hirohito to social events after WW2 when we KNEW that he orchestrated those home invasion incest rapes. We KNEW who he was and we still made him feel like the Belle of the Ball.
I’m sure her rapists get the BEST service in HK restaurants that would deny her entry.
I think it is too late for whoever’s family to erase the authenticity of her interview over a bowl of congee or noodles or whatever. I think the integrity of that interview stands and you cannot erase it from the minds of the public however silent and inactive they may behave. they may not reach out to her and they may not save her when they see her being grabbed or harmed on the street but they KNOW.
if you can’t stand up for her and do something for her then you expose your society’s reputation to Japan’s ongoing propoganda that the Chinese deserve to be bullied because we don’t establish not only the moral outrage but we don’t ACT upon that outrage. It’s not enough to not be a criminal ourselves, we have to act on behalf of victims, we have to inconvenience ourselves and we have to make the bad guys understand that there will be a backlash. so far I am seeing ZERO backlash with regard to both Chinese organized crime AND Japanese warmongers. Go figure. Why do we bother raising children with morals if THIS is the world they are brought into?
do you think it is enough to simply be clever and avoid trouble like Carina Lau who won’t even have a baby?
REALLY?
do you think that Lam Geet Ying ASKED for this because after the fact, she isn’t handling it well or because she has a reputation for stubbornness whereas Carina has one for flexibility and social diplomacy? She didn’t sound diplomatic when asked about Lam Geet Ying’s reported rapes – look at that video again.
Do you think that Carina Lau has handled her assault satisfactorily and wants everyone to mind their own business or do you think she can’t do anything about it because there isn’t enough fighting of crime – criminals are not running scared.
Yakuza are regularly getting caught with kiddie porn at the Manila airport – that means they are still raping Asian children and they are NOT ashamed. It’s just a BLIP in their porn operation, right?
What about those kids? do you think they are HANDLING their assaults better than Lam Geet Ying? Are we supposed to be impatient and unsympathetic towards them as the invested parties are interested in our lambasting Lam Geet Ying?
This is really unacceptable. If the press does NOT remark on this attitude towards rape victims’ discombobulation then WHAT are you doing as your job? What is the POINT of your career? Journalistic integrity should not be considered and attributed to the profession if this OBVIOUS issue is not being addressed.
This is such a bad sign that she better put everything in writing and on video about what she feels is the truth and then give it to an overseas human rights organization to release in the event of her demise or incarceration a la Frances Farmer because no lawyer in Hong Kong should be trusted now. If she sends a copy to the Chinese government, there’s no guarantee they will not respect her privacy if it is useful to her. She’s not trying to become more infamous – she should want her voice heard posthumously in the event that another injustice is done to her.
This retraction is NOT a good sign and I don’t mean for her reputation or her integrity.
I GET that there’s no money or profit motivation in going after rapes or murders of civilians by organized crime unless it leads to some bigger investigation. I get that but wouldn’t it be FUN to go after rapists and murderers just to put a similar scare in them that they put on the innocent?
I think it would be REALLY FUN.
I think it would be fun AND it would be effective if we gave rapists pause. it WOULD make the world a better place.
Feel bad for her and have heard many snippets of her life and love life through the years. It is really depressing and sad. I do not think it is a big deal if she is telling the truth about being raped or not because she is already at a very low point in her life and has been depressed for many years so just because she admits or does not admit to being raped will not make much more difference.
she’s never been caught in a lie has she? her greatest crime in decades seems to be that she is unkempt? her public behavior has never come close to Bus Uncle on youtube as well as a myriad of other absolutely sane but grouchy Hong Kong citizens – the BIG thing is that she is not well groomed, correct?
if reporters approached you while you were out and about and spoke to you in the way they speak to her – wouldn’t a normal HK citizen be even RUDER than she has been? She hasn’t been rude to them – she has just rejected them.
Don’t forget her sitting on the street – SMOKING a cigarette, shopping for sunglasses are all the actions of a typical low income Hong Konger but the BIG DEAL is that she is superior in appearance to many successful wealthy reported courtesans and apparently she has failed or refused to succeed at exploiting her good looks.
So she must be insane, right?
I never knew that she was friends with Alan Tam. Yammie seems to have many good friends in the e circle so that shows that she must have a good character. It is so sad that her life is like the way it is now. I wonder if it is fate because many things happened beyond her control? I guess that is when you question if it is fate/destiny or your own decisions/actions?? I believe it is a combination of both.
how much is that friendship worth other than burnishing his image as a protector of many and LEADER of celebs?
people really need to reassess the concept of friendship when they mean lunch buddies and acquaintances and people to do things with.
The only time I have ever come across a sincere and accurate assessment of friendship was in a Chaim Potok book but I can’t remember what it was other than it was quality over quantity.
I think Andy Lau offering to toss her a temporary salve that is probably less than what he donates to some even is not good for her either – it might have disqualified her from public housing – I don’t know.
those amounts are not what she needs and DEFINITELY telling the press that you are her friend and always there for her – that’s useless.
she has a stipend – it’s bare bones – she has shelter – she needs protection – too bad she is not a child or deaf to qualify for someone like Josephine Siao to take an interest in her – whoever shelters her would have to be able to not worry about retaliated against rape-wise – no kids of their own to worry about
but don’t pretend that anyone thus far has been a yeng hung on her behalf – they absolutely have not.
she needs something that makes her hands off. Apparently, Carina Lau enjoys that now.
don’t forget that Lam Geet Ying has never done anything to deserve this
People have been suspicious of either Eric Tsang or Jackie Chan, who both have very questionable love lives. They were said to be in Singapore during her time at a promotional event. I guess it didn’t help that her tvb drama made her relive being raped again. She never recovered after being in that drama with Adam Chang. Poor woman. She needs medication and psychological care, not ridicule.
I hope that’s not what happened to Dada when she suddenly left because people pushed her to the edge with sexual propositions. She has eluded to the film industry as being very complicated and she cannot say anything in front of the camera because of the scrutiny she will face.
wow, Hong Kong sucks. But in America, those same vicious criminals hide behind a harmless ABC image and American accent. They’re still dangerous and they still get away with it. Nobody cares.
at least in HK, the police are clearly against gangsters but in America, socially, we can’t seem to be as adamently and clearly against organized crime. HK Police makes me feel better but the problem of organized crime taking great liberties seems to be far worse there – possibly because our jails have a worse reputation.
Eric Tsang – is charitable (and sincerely, in his own way. not in that pretentious ‘look at me’ Jackie Chan way). And fugly though he is, I doubt Eric has problems bedding women.
Jackie Chan – he has so many affairs with biggie names, Nammi would be very ordinary fare for him.
Why does no one think Emperor? He’s so proud of bedding people his wife doesn’t know about, and he’s ruthless.
Talking about Jackie, saw on TV and he said something like “If a movie is good, that movie need not be promoted. If it is bad, whatever the promotion movie is still bad”.
I was wondering if he was thinking about his acting prowess, as in whatever the accolades and awards, it is still bad?
Kidding! Kidding!
Anyway Jackie as the suspected one? I don’t think so. He doesn’t need to do rape. He has women jumping into his bed willingly.
@ Funn:
I have thought for a long time Jackie Chan is an acrobatic monkey who happened to hit lucky, and a useless scumbag of a human being as a person (despite all the acts of charity and Big Fecking Brother role he holds) = I don’t have any respect for him at all.
But somehow I also don’t think he would need to resort to rape to bed Nami.
And Eric, I just don’t think so. Despite his gutter mouth, the guy does have a heart.
I think it is really bad the way Chinese reporters in Hong Kong and in America do not print the perpetrators’ names but they have no problem lying about murder victims and posting home addresses and such. That is unforgivable. They can write whatever they want against Lam Geet Ying just like they did about Kenny Wee because their opponents have power. I don’t think very much of Ying Chan at all so it is not great to me that she now trains journalists in Hong Kong.
no one ever grabs criminals and THROW them into a van for a lesson in respect but meanwhile, they have NO problem doing that to anyone they want – as long as they plan it well, they get away with everything
no one ever tags them let alone bags them – no one ever runs THEM over with an SUV
I think the police need to find out the name that was beeped out by asking the reporter privately and they turn some screws on any invested associates – you have to send a message or she’s going to end up on a snuff film.
every sheltered and respectable Chinese like my mother has always KNOWN how gangsters operate without ever having entered a gambling den, a brothel, without ever having been in contact until very late in life and it’s just the nature of Chinese society that this street wisdom is passed on and morally we are VERY clear eyed – we SEE when someone is not right – we aren’t confused by poltical correctness or leveraged by our own moral failings.
As a Chinese – we know – we ALL know. We don’t need Occam’s Razor. Trouble is trouble.
the more they think about this flare, this exposure, the more furious they get because they are EMBOLDENED by how the press covers it and the police aren’t visible – they will feel INVITED to teach her a lesson. Get it?
so what if she wasn’t good enough to marry into New World or whoever the heir was? so what if she smokes and is from a low background – whoever could have afforded to shelter her and doesn’t is responsible for what will happen to her and I will hate Hong Kong society for letting this happen because unlike other vulnerables – she is in the press – her face is known – and you could have done something instead of bidding for truffles.
you know what? she should be GIVEN a job as a UN celebrity representative. It would be better than Angelina Jolie or those Japanese idols making the rounds in the most appalling inappropriateness.
She would do a good job – its a pity she isn’t better educated but I think she should be given a job like that – it would really APPALL her enemies.
I doubt that a Pakistani earthquake survivor would belittle her for needing a haircut.
give her a job that is respectable and doesn’t allow third parties to approach her to build mischaracterizations against her
and give her some money
JESUS!
I just want her to get better soon
Chinese government is going to collect evidence of black marks and HK government and pd will lose their self governance. China might not step in but they will collect information and hold it against other governments as a sign that they have no right to judge or curb China.
Such a sad experience for her n she is kinda pretty I suppose n will she ever recover huh!
Problem is: with obvious mental instability and years of being in this condition, her credibility also drops.
Even if she’s speaking 100% truth and naming 100% genuine perpectrators; people will also question the content and credibility of what she says.
if it were someone else like those women who claim to have relationships with Andy Lau or whatever then it might be the case but the whole picture with Lam Geet Ying doesn’t mar her credibility at all – it reinforces it.
i think operatives voicing disbelief like rosamund kwan will just backlash onto the decrier and further aggravate a sympathetic public.
Very true and I find that really sad. Also, so much time has passed as well, therefore, it will be harder for her to get any justice if she was raped,especially if the suspects have passed away. If she can get justice in this lifetime, maybe she will get it when she reaches the other side??
there’s NO justice – we don’t have that kind of police and law enforcement – they should just make sure she isn’t attacked again