IF you cannot find Mr Lee Seng Kee at home, he is probably up in the tree.
No, the 68-year-old retiree is not plucking fruits.
He is quite comfortably nestled in the three-storey-high tree house that he has built in front of his home, in a quiet private estate in the eastern part of Singapore.
About a year ago, Mr Lee built the tree house around a large mango tree planted in the garden of his semi-detached house.
The tree house is made up of metal planks and supported by steel beams.
Mr Lee, who lives with his wife, also built aluminum staircases so he could move easily between each storey.
He told The New Paper that he planted the mango tree 12 years ago. He even cross-bred the tree so that it now produces four different types of mangoes.
Last year, the retired civil servant decided to build a tree house because he wanted to be able to climb up and reach the mangoes, to wrap and protect them from insects and birds.
It turned out to be good shelter from the heat for him too.
So he bought more steel and aluminum materials and extended the tree house further up.
He did most of the work himself, but got some help from some foreign workers who are tenants at his house.
Mr Lee, who had a stroke six years ago, said the tree house helps him get some exercise. He climbs up daily.
He said his neighbours have never complained about his tree house or the branches of his mango tree hanging over their gardens.
SHARES MANGOES
'If my mangoes fall into their gardens, the fruits are theirs. They can even pluck the mangoes if they wish,' he said.
The tree house, which has tables and chairs on every level, is also a good spot for stargazing, Mr Lee added.
'Some nights, I would sit in my tree house to admire the moon and stars and fall asleep till past midnight.'
He joins his wife in bed only after he wakes up.
He said his tree house is still a work in progress. But for now, he has stopped building it because the cost of metal has gone up.
And Mr Lee isn't the only resident with green fingers in the neighbourhood.
In the next estate, retiree Choon Keng Hong, 70, built a two-storey-high wooden shed in the garden of his semi-detached home.
Like Mr Lee, Mr Choon built his shed around his fruit trees - mango, jambu, longan, rambutan, and chiku - to keep out the sun.
Mr Choon claims his tree can bear mangoes weighing up to 2kg each.
He said he built the zinc-roofed shed with discarded materials from nearby homes that were being renovated.
With agility that's rare for someone his age, the elderly man demonstrated to us how he climbed onto the roof of the shed using the trunk and branches of his mango tree.
This article was first published in The New Paper on Jun 16, 2008.
