A Yee Tenement House Moment

This is one of those posts I conceived and mentally drafted a long time ago. It only made it to the computer yesterday.

Senior year of college I lived in a memorable place. It was a triplex house where each level held a different apartment unit. I lived on the first floor with my wonderful apartmentmates. The owner of the building was Mr. Yee. He was a landlord who did not like spending money unless he had to. This lead to some cheap repairs and neglect. Derek started calling our living place the Yee Tenement House. If you are not familiar with a tenement house, check out the Google image results.

Below are some examples of what we dealt with.

Smoke Detectors
To celebrate end of classes, Rohit and I obtained some cigars. We sat in the living room of our apartment as we enjoyed them. About half way through my cigar I glanced up at a corner of the room. Through the smoke I noticed there was a smoke detector in the room. I realized the combination of smoke, a smoke detector, and silence was cause for concern. Rohit checked it out and discovered there was no battery in the detector. During our initial walk through 11 months earlier, Mr. Yee had demonstrated the smoke detectors worked by pressing the test button. Unknown to us, after he did this he removed the batteries from both of the smoke detectors.

Fire Extinguishers
There was a fire extinguisher in the kitchen next to the sink. A week or two after we moved in, I took a close look at it. The gauge on the extinguisher very clearly pointed to REPLACE. Considering the state of the smoke detectors explained above, if there was a fire no one would know about it and hence no one would reach for a fire extinguisher.

Towel Bars
The towel bar in one of the bathrooms was broken by an earlier tenant. Instead of replacing the metal towel bar with a new one, Mr. Yee wrapped the broken part of the bar with aluminium foil. It could not support the weight of even a small towel.

Falling Ceilings
Once the ceiling above the bathtub started cracking and breaking. A few pieces dropped from the ceiling and the bar holding the shower curtain rod fell. Luckily Patrick was not hurt. However, after the near death experience of my Associate at his apartment Mr. Yee's bathroom seems safe.

Yee Tenement House Moments
Since I moved out, certain situations have reminded me of my stay at the Tenement House. For example, the last time I saw a smoke detector surrounded by smoke and no alarm from the detector I remembered my earlier experience. I call these times which generate flashbacks Yee Tenement House moments.

While the above list is a start, it is by no means comprehensive. Other things which can lead to Yee Tenement House Moments include non-flushing toilets, leaking roofs, missing floorboards, and broken big screen TVs. If you can easily enter an apartment through the closed and locked window next to the door that also counts. Peter easily got in once when he forgot his key.


We are smiling because all five of us survived the Yee Tenement House, even if Derek is not pictured above.