HONG KONG - A tired-looking Gillian Chung attended actress Kara Hui's birthday banquet on Thursday (Feb 1) evening, hours after the Cantopop star announced her engagement to Taiwanese doctor Michael Lai on social media.

At an ad hoc press conference at the dinner, Chung told a fuller story of their whirlwind romance, after raising her hands to show she had forgotten to wear her engagement ring, said Apple Daily.

Lai, 29, had proposed to her on her 37th birthday on Jan 21, after a six-month, long-distance courtship, she said.

Asked if it was too soon, she answered: "He has his merits. He's good to me. You could say I met the right person at the right time."

She had stayed in Taiwan for months last year to film the Web drama, Tree In The River. In August, she was spotted at Beaute J'adore, the beauty clinic where Lai works. In October, she confirmed reports that she was dating him.

On Thursday, her lunar birthday, she gave him a score of more than 100 points.

"The most touching thing is that he's willing to tolerate my bad habits," she said. "From the beginning, I showed him all the bad things. If you can accept them, accept them. And he accepted the whole lot."

Asked about her bad habits, she said she was lazy, adding that her fiance had worked hard to maintain their long-distance relationship.

So when is the wedding? Is she moving to Taiwan?

"He's just proposed, I haven't planned, it's too sudden, a lot of things haven't been planned."

She also said she could not be pregnant, not when she has to give concerts in May.

"You want me to do that while heavy with child?"