draft oneThe school seems to be bursting at its seams in between classes, with students transiting from class to class, the excited sounds of greetings between friends who have probably met an hour ago can be heard throughout the whole length of the narrow winding staircases that creep up the sides of the building. Some students shuffle quickly through the throng, with a hurried but not curt demeanor. Old lecture theatre doors creak and squeak as students flow through them like people at a train station, chairs scrape the floor as others settle into their classrooms. Sometimes doors are shut with a bang, and a quiet falls over the campus as afternoon classes resume again.
At the intersection between the largest lecture theatre in our campus and the block of classrooms, a steep and narrow flight of stairs lead down to a little alcove hidden away from view of casual passersby. This ‘little hole in the wall’, as we band members term it, is our band room, exclusive to the members of the school symphonic band and sometimes close friends of band members. On a warm Wednesday afternoon, the warbling sound of a trumpet attempting the scales on a cold instrument can be heard when classes have yet to end. The shaky scales soon gain confidence as our trumpet player warms up, and in a short time, strong and familiar melodies are joined by the voices in our heads. In our ears and mind, it was the anticipation of a good afternoon practice to come, but to the others, it was simply noise. By ‘our’ and ‘we’, I refer to the other band members who are still in our classes, and by ‘Others’, I refer to the other students in the school who are not involved in our band activities. I term it as such because we band members appear to be an exclusive community of our own within the performing groups in our school, and the band room is our common gathering ground. Our devotion to our second home is often met with bewilderment as to why such a place would hold such a dear place in our hearts. To us, it is cozy, homely and beautiful, but to them it is dilapidated and unappealing, perhaps just like the rest of the old school campus that has been around for twenty odd years.
The alcove is actually the entrance to the band room, with an old sofa stuffed into the dark and dusty crook underneath the stairs, the stuffing of its cushions visible through the many perforations of its leather skin. Who knows how much dirt and dust has accumulated in the corner and what animals has made its nest in the sofa? Other students, even when invited, decline to have a seat, regarding it with disdain. However before every band practice and in between classes, it is not surprising to find a band member or two relaxing in it. To us, it is a common practice to peer down into the alcove to see if we find a familiar face taking a break from the rest of the school crowd. It may be dirty but we do not seem to care. The sloping bottom of the stairs is marked by generations of band members scribbling their thoughts and inspirations, random complaints of a bad day at school. Some of us spend time figuring out which song those faded lyrics belonged to, compared handwritings and added our own with much enthusiasm.
The tall black doors to the band room are set in the wall of the alcove, revealing a double set of doors within. Immediately to the left is our store room, the place where we store our instruments between practice sessions. It is a long and narrow room that could, at the stretched definition of comfort, accommodate the movement of two medium sized people dallying about their routines. It is especially crowded before and after practices when members are hurrying to get themselves ready for practice or for their trip home. It is most definitely not a place for the claustrophobic, and probably could be a fire hazard for that short period of time. The room is dimly lit by lights that cast an orange hue, and the tall wooden and metal shelves that line the opposite sides of the room hide years of dust in their bellies. Dark colored cases that sometimes lay scattered across the floor protect expensive instruments from the polluted environment. At the end of the room, probably the most obscure corner of the band room stands three metal cabinets that house the music scores that we own, cased in paper boxes in various stages of decay. A short corridor, which consists of two doors barely two meters apart, leads to the other entrance to the main part of the band room. This is probably the most detestable part to people who do not frequent our band room. However to me, I have always thought that it was a place where people were forced to come closer together, not just physically, but socially as we exchange our experiences during the rush and cultivate an atmosphere of unity. It benefited everyone because anticipating each others needs increased our efficiency and our coordination with each other, which is important to us band members whose main goals were to produce good music together.
My friend once visited me and another band member in our hole – we were always holed up in the band room whenever it was open and we were free. “The air smells like ammonia,” she sniffed. Being built into the underground, there are no windows in this space of ours, there is a lack of proper ventilation due to the constant air-conditioned state of the room, a result of the hot humid weather of Singapore. The first thing that probably hits others in the face would be the stale smell of a room kept in the dark for too long, while we are used to it. Occasionally screams and yells are heard by those above, as some of the weak-hearted scramble away frantically to avoid a cockroach that has come out of hiding to brave the shower of insecticide that eventually rain on it, worsening the musty smell in the stale air as the noxious fumes disperse. The soft wooden floor is scratched by metal chair feet that has lost its rubber shoe and dented by objects dropped in carelessness. Dark wooden beams that rise upwards to the ceiling are part of the acoustic installations play less and less of a role in preventing complaints that we are disturbing a lecture in the neighboring lecture theatre.
Observing from the conductor’s podium at the front of the room, a mixture of shiny and rusted foldable metal stands lie cluttered in a short and wide cardboard box that threatens to fall apart any moment contrasts the tall stacks of chairs on the right side of the room. At the back, rough and battered looking black risers that seem to have endured as many knocks and scrapes as a child’s knees displays many strange exhibits. There is a stray chair or two, and random huge stuffed animals left behind by seniors who feel the same way we do about this room, mothballs, loose scores and forgotten possessions that have been unclaimed for too long. To the left, percussion instruments are left in disarray by the whims of our percussion section, completing the general untidy and dusty impression we leave on visitors to our territory.
Yet despite all the mess, dirt and grime, we still see beauty in our band room. The displaced chairs tell me someone else has been here and I am likely to meet more people, the acoustic installations remind me of the grand pipe organs in concerts where we have performed and made happy memories with each other as friends and performers on stage. Unpolished but unforgotten trophies are lined up in unglamorous cabinets, a souvenir flag from a performance overseas hang quietly behind the conductor’s podium does not beautify the appearance of the band room, but beautifies my experience of it. The worn out cover of the band room gives it a rustic charm in our hearts, enhancing our experience of belonging to a community special and exclusive to ourselves. In time our juniors will find and regard our forgotten possessions as part of the place, and read the words we have written. It is a place where we alone feel like we own the place, where we spend time and make memories, but others feel left out of our private circle, being unable to see the same beauty we do.
Others will never see the band room through our eyes, to be impressed to the point of commending it as beautiful. My friends have often commented that they feel we effuse a hostile and exclusive vibe to non-band members. They are ‘outsiders’ who cannot identify with our feeling of attachment and love towards such a place. However, I am confident that in everyone else’s heart, they will have their very own ‘band room’; a world of their own, somewhere they are familiar with and feel like they belong to it and it belongs to them.
