KCOBA Dinner Dance 20th July 2013

QCOGA Girls at the Dance!

Ladies I have to tell you about this event, The King’s College Old Boy’s Association Inaugural Dinner Dance that I attended.  It was indeed a very well attended event, with it appears nearly 250 attendees and it was so nice to see them in all of their finery. and what finery it was.  

The point I wanted to make was that after having been shocked when my presence as the President of the QCOGA (UK) branch  was acknowledged, the shock pretty soon gave way to humility and if I am honest with you my fellow QCOGs   felt more then a little red faced! I felt acutely aware of the inactivity of QCOGA ( UK) of recent times, of which I must shoulder the Lion’s share of the blame, not to detract from the good work of the individual sets, but clearly I have to look at the wider picture on alumni of an illustrious school such as ours. 

I have to say that listening to them sing their school song, with so much gusto I was quite in awe, and they all knew all the words to all the verses! It really is a fabulous song, befitting, but I was particularly stirred by verse 3 that went as follows

‘Present, past and future form one mighty whole

Shining forth emblazoned on the muster roll

When the call is sounded all must answer “here”

Voice and bearing showing neither shame nor fear

Pointing to our honour which stands bright

As when we took it from our founder’s hands’

It’s there, in the ‘from one mighty whole’ the idea of unity standing and working together, it’s almost a lion’s call. At least that is what i was hearing, the display of comradeship amongst the men who were but boys in KC was incredible, the hailing of each other, the old school rituals all there, present, ticked and marked off.  I feel that its pertinent that we sing 

‘Pass on the Torch, still brightly gleaming, ....’ in our school song, another call to arms, pass on to the next generation, a similar pretext all very stirring. 

It was interesting to hear of  the challenges  faced by the alunmni of King’s College, the broken kitchens, the over crowding, the annexes, falling standards and so on and so forth.   How similar they are to ours! Having attended this event, I am feeling extremely invigorated and a quite a bit nostalgic, remember our dinner dances and all that went into planning and executing them in trying to raise funds for our alma mater! So now I am heeding a call and i am extending that call you my fellow QCOGs.

I have to say that I was surprised at how many ladies went up to have their picture taken as being part of Queen’s College- knock me for six call me a snob, but i do believe that that Queen’s college, Yaba is the Queen’s College and our only true affiliation is with Queen’s school Ibadan! Please do correct me if I’m wrong, but i do find it rather irksome that others like to ride off the back.

Then there is the issue of the standard of the school in present times, I have had people tell me, that we are feeding off our past history and that we are not that good, which in effect may be true, but people need to understand that history cannot be re-written, we learn from it, we improve on it but re-write it? Thats not possible. we do however have an opportunity to be part of those that chose to learn from history and work to secure a better future for our alma mater.