The popular actress’ recent appearances at Melaka’s tourism and heritage sites, including strolling in Jonker Walk in the city’s Chinatown and sampling local fare, attracted hordes of starstruck fans and sparked a frenzy that sent searches for “Melaka” spiking on Chinese social media.
Melaka is banking on Fan’s star power, Chinese consumers’ love for durians and Malaysia’s visa-free policy to attract more Chinese holidaymakers to the south-western state. One million Chinese tourists is the goal for Visit Melaka 2024, said state executive councillor for Tourism, Heritage, Arts and Culture Abdul Razak Abdul Rahman in May.
In 2023, Malaysia welcomed about 20 million tourists, with almost 1.5 million of them from China. Of the 8.63 million visitors who flocked to Melaka in 2023, only 204,818 were from China, and most of them were day trippers.
Fan is a household name in China, with 63 million followers on microblogging platform Weibo. She is known for her roles in the Chinese TV epic The Empress Of China and the movie X-Men: Days Of Future Past.
The actress was included as the highest-paid celebrity in the Forbes China Celebrity 100 list from 2013 to 2017, and appeared on Time magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in 2017.She disappeared from the public eye for several months in 2018 amid a tax evasion scandal, was fined more than 800 million yuan (S$150 million) and resurfaced later that year to publicly apologise for her actions.
“For me, it is truly an honour to be appointed as the Melaka Tourism Ambassador 2024. After the Covid-19 pandemic (2020 to 2022), my mind was very unsettled, and I had not travelled abroad,” said the 42-year-old actress.
“However, post-pandemic tourism has become lively again, and people will surely choose places they have never visited before,” she was quoted as saying by the New Straits Times daily on June 16.
On her first visit to Melaka, Fan was busy playing tourist, visiting famous sites and trying local delicacies such as chicken rice balls, cendol and durian.
“Malaysia is familiar to me because I have a Malaysian colleague. We have worked together for several years,” said Fan, adding that she chose Melaka as a holiday destination in 2024 because of the intriguing historical links between Melaka and China.
“Chinese tourists coming to Malaysia can rest assured the locals here are also fluent in Mandarin. Moreover, Melaka has similarities with Yunnan province in (south-western) China as both have a rich history,” she noted.
Melaka’s history with China dates back to the Ming Dynasty, when explorer Zheng He sailed the Maritime Silk Route, and visited Melaka several times during his many expeditions around Asia in the 15th century.
Melaka Chief Minister Ab Rauf Yusoh, who met Fan at his office in the Seri Negeri state building in Ayer Keroh, said he hoped she can create a positive impact for Melaka tourism.
“Fan Bingbing is influential and her fans will follow her, placing Melaka at an advantage,” he said.
He added that the state government was fortunate as Fan’s manager is a Malaysian and she suggested that the actress could offer her help to promote the state.
Fan was in Melaka from June 14 to 16, just before Chinese Premier Li Qiang’s arrival in Malaysia on June 18 for a three-day visit to mark 50 years of diplomatic ties between the two countries.
Fan officially started her first day as Melaka’s tourism ambassador on June 14 in the heart of the state capital, also called Melaka, clad in an embroidered Nonya kebaya.
Hundreds of the star’s fans had gathered as early as 10am to get a glimpse of her arrival at the iconic red Stadthuys building in the heart of the city and to snap wefies with her.
It was a whirlwind of activity for the actress over the next two days, visiting attractions such as the Porta De Santiago or A Famosa fortress, enjoying a river cruise, and holding meet-and-greet sessions at various locations with fans. On one of those forays, Fan was spotted wearing a striking red cheongsam-inspired dress by well-known Malaysian designer Bernard Chandran.
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