B.B. Helped Me

Written by Private Samuel Chin of the 10th Kuala Lumpur Company

Published November 21st, 2014

Between the two uniformed organisations my school has, my first choice was the St. Johns. The Boys Brigade seemed hard, boring, sad, and tiring. BB is very different from the St. Johns, the most obvious being it's greater difficulty.

However, the BB has helped me in my daily life. BB has drilled in all its members patience, obedience, discipline, passion, integrity and many more traits which I am yet to discover. It’s hard trying to do everything BB has told us to do, but I still try. Sadly, till today, I am only barely able to practice obedience and discipline.

My first year in BB was as a Year 7 student. It was hard. The only thing that was keeping me in BB were the ranks. I thought it was all about ranks. I thought if I didn’t have any ranks then I would simply be nobody in BB. So I kept working at it. The road was hard, sometimes unfair, hurtful and lonely, so the only thing I could do was persevere.

When I was younger, nobody enjoyed watching me - I was both very naughty and hyper – not a good combination. I would scream, run around and annoy people all day long. Yet I gradually changed when I joined BB. I didn’t realise it, but people started liking me better, and my parents told me that I was actually maturing. I could socialise better with people, I could behave myself.

Still, BB wasn't something I enjoyed. I could see that BB changed me, but I didn’t think I had the energy to go on in BB every single morning. At first, it was my mum who forced me to join. Yet it all changed with my entry to the band.

When I joined the band, BB started to look more interesting. A good character trait I learned from the band was self-control. While joining band, I have to go to bed early every Friday even if there was my favourite show on TV. BB has slowly been helping me change for the better.

Yet, I still didn’t feel like going for BB. Eventually after time, I started liking BB more. Now I have learned another very good trait which is perseverance. I persevered on, I continued going for BB. Over time I found the joy of going to BB.

From this time onwards it was climbing ranks. Now I am a private, though I wanted to be at least a lance corporal this year. I couldn’t achieve it. Many things got in my way, including bad time management. BB taught me that prioritization and hard work was important.

Some would think that BB is useless, not benefiting anyone or just being a uniform body that wants money. Nothing could be further from the truth. BB builds us, helps us and guides us where our parents or any family or close friends can’t.

BB has changed my life; BB isn’t all about torture or scolding, but about helping build your skills and character. Such is something everyone joining BB has to understand to improve.