The St Joseph's School Band members celebrating their achievement with Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah (seated centre, in grey jacket) upon arriving at Kuching International Airport on Thursday night. - ZULAZHAR SHEBLEE / THE STAR
KUCHING: The St Joseph's School Band has taken a commendable second place in the European Open Championship in Germany.
The 70-member band finished behind Thailand's Ratchasima Witthayalai Marching Band in the marching show band category with 88 points, 2.5 points shy of the winning score, during the competition on June 30.
By scoring above 80 points, the band also received a gold medal award for their Romeo and Juliet-inspired drill show titled "Star-Crossed Lovers".
Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah, whose granddaughter plays the flute in the band, said Sarawakians could take pride in their success, which was the result of hard work.
"We're indeed very proud of their achievement. I noticed my granddaughter spent a lot of time training, even the whole day on weekends, so I hope their victory will teach them that to succeed, it needs a lot of effort, training, patience and hard work," he said when welcoming the band members home at Kuching International Airport on Thursday (July 4) night.
"I'm surprised that they managed to get second place because this is an international competition, but looking back at how much effort and sacrifice of time they put in, I think we should expect them to win," Uggah added.
Tuba player Darell Giem, 17, said the band members were "quite nervous" in the competition but managed to overcome it as a team.
"Finally, we got a gold medal and second place out of 20 teams," he said, adding that the band learned to bond together as a family during their time in Germany.
Saxophonist Harith Ilyas, also 17, said the cooler weather in Germany was one of the challenges faced by the band.
"We're used to practising in hot and humid weather, but there it was a culture shock practising in the cold temperature. We just had to adapt.
"We set high expectations but we said to ourselves, as long as we give our best, it's enough for us.
"We put a lot of work, time and sacrifice into this and to have it pay off is really nice," he said.
For Rahul Tashreem Shah Salwerdy, 21, teamwork was the key to the band's achievement.
"We managed to pull it off because we did everything together and we got closer every day," he said.
The European Open Championship on June 28-30 was part of the International Music Festival in Rastede, Germany.
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