Standing on any downtown street amid the relentless swirl of the crowded thoroughfares, of men in sharp suits, women, attired for success, breathing the polluted air of a wealth-obsessed culture, marching to the incessant roar of traffic, sometimes you just want to stop and imagine there must be a place somewhere, high above it all - a garden of tranquility, perhaps. Well, there is such a place - many of them, actually.

Most people, driven by fear that millions of dollars may rest on one single minute, have no time to look upward or daydream about places that are green, restful and capable of lifting the burdens of the soul.

Osbert Lam and Andrew Tsui are among the few who have experienced urban farms presenting green oases amid the urban desert.

"Three years ago, I never thought of operating farms on rooftops," said 51-year-old Lam of City Farm, in a casual suit, hair tied back in a braid.

Riding the lift to the top of a 14-floor industrial building at Tai Koo, a short walk up to the roof reveals a 100-meter square patch, carpeted with green vegetables. It's Lam's "secret garden", where golden yellow cucumbers ripen in the sun, and long slender towel gourds peek out from among the leaves.

"I can get about 20 kilograms of vegetables every year from a patch like this," said Lam. Before turning to rooftop farming, Lam did his gardening on rented fields in the New Territories. Three years ago he abandoned his cherished village life and moved to Hong Kong Island. "I think I'm becoming transformed into an urban farmer," said Lam.

Hong Kong's population density is the highest in the world, so are its residential rental rates. Developable land is getting scarce and the government has started eyeing country parks and fields in the New Territories. For those who maintain their love for growing things, like Lam, spaces for them to take up urban farming are treasured links to their former lives in the villages.

Tsui's urban farm isn't far from Lam's. It's on the rooftop of the Bank of America Tower - right in the heart of the city, in Central. His urban farm, looking out over a broad view of Victoria Harbor, is surrounded by skyscrapers: the Bank of China Tower and the International Financial Center nearby. The space originally was intended as a helipad. Wearing a sports shirt, Tsui, loosening the top soil with a fork, said his aim is to earn a "sustainable living."

"I ran into the idea of urban farming by chance," said Tsui, who operates a social enterprise Time to Grow, in cooperation with Jones Lang LaSalle, a Chicago-based company providing investment management services. Tsui worked for years as a wealth manager before taking up rooftop farming.

"Urban farming is more than doing agriculture in a city," he said. "In Hong Kong, 90 percent of the food is imported. People, especially children, have no sense of how vegetables are planted and where they come from. So urban farming is also about building up the relationship between urban residents and the food they eat, by re-using fallow spaces in the city: rooftops, balconies, window ledges," said Tsui.

Tsui spent the last six months assembling people with different skills. "From the supply of seeds, growing and watering, to food transportation, we have built our own network with people from different sectors of the society," said Tsui.

Tsui said he plans to engage farmers like Lam to teach others on farming techniques for the community at large. "With the trend toward urbanization, farmers will always be treasured members of the community," said Tsui.

sylvia@chinadailyhk.com

(HK Edition 09/23/2014 page4)