I have been teaching and dancing BellyDance for many years, and before not anyone could perform publicly unless prooved to be qualified by a previous audition without your own music, to know if you knew all the basics a bellydancer should know before going on stage in front of audience, specially Arabian high class families.
Nowadays dancers from all over the world are following a BellyDance style of the modern egyptian bellydancers which started from the times of Fifi Abdou, followed by Dina and right now Randa Kamel.
I consider, from my own experience, that this new fashion of bellydance, of having big breast showing most of it, long nails and long hair until the bottom, is not the Traditional Egyptian BellyDance Style.
These new bellydancers started this fashion in Egypt in the late 1990's, but was not like this before.
Probably this new fashion started since the end of the URSS and many russian beautiful women moved to Egypt looking for a better life, many of them dressed up with bellydance costumes and started to do bad competence (without learning to dance properly, not respecting the BellyDancing rules and styles, selling BellyDance bodies instead of their Art) and started to create a problem with the Egyptian native bellydancers, arriving to the point that the Egyptian Goverment had to bann all foreigners from performing in Egypt.
Two years later the good quality non-egyptian Bellydancers living in Egypt, got together and asked the Egyptian Goverment to allow foreigners to perform in Egypt, but not any foreigner can perform there nowadays, the Egyptian Goverment stated rules and bellydance inspectors to controll the foreigner bellydancers, nowadays if you are caught dancing in Egypt without your license, you get a fine of $20,000 USD or 2 years at Egyptian prision.
This is the reason why BellyDance has become "haram" as Egyptian's say, this new fashion style has distroy BellyDance in Egypt, and is now distroying BellyDance in the rest of the world.
I am tired of seen everyday in all bellydance media, posters of "Festivals" with the photos of BellyDancers as if they were all selling their body, instead of selling their art. They all look like saying "Come to watch me, I am very sexy".
Instead, old fashion Egyptian BellyDancers were more natural posing, natural smiles, with small and more natural breast and never showing it more than necesary, short to medium hair, and normal nails.
I myself enjoy watching BellyDancers, but not those who are sexy or looks like their breast is going to jump out of their bra!
I was told once in 2007 by an Egyptian woman in Alexandria EGYPT: "You have the moral responsability to clean up the bad image of BellyDance in Egypt", her comment after watching my videos, really affected me and I will never forget.
This is why every day since then, I am trying to do that, to help Egyptians start loving and respecting BellyDancers like in old times, in Golden Age times, the times of Sohair Zaki, Mona Said, Nagwa Fouad, Samia Gamal, Taheya Karioka, Kety, Naima Akef, and many more.
In actual fact, are more Traditional Egyptian BellyDancers Style the old fashion foreigner teachers living abrod of Egypt, those dancers who travelled to Egypt to learn from the Masters Egyptian teachers of the 70's & 80's, when Internet was not still hapenning. Those foreigner bellydancers are not considered back in their country as good dancers or teachers as the nowadays Egyptians, but in reality are highly respecting the Traditional rules of BellyDance.
In 2008 I was working as the BellyDancer of the at the Sheraton 5* Hotel-Resort in Sharm El Sheikh (EGYPT), and the artist director told me once: "Foreigners will save BellyDance in Egypt" and I think he was right.
Ironically, those foreigner are the ones that started to promote back in their countries BellyDance, and thanks to them, now everyone in the World know about this dance; but they are not considered by the none of the Festivals an attraction to learn from them, instead they preffer to bring Egyptian bellydancers who are not anymore dancing traditional style.
This is why I reccomend to all my students that if they want to go to a BellyDance Festival, go to learn from the legends: Sohair Zaki, Mona Said, Nagwa Fouad or Fifi Abdou. There is only one Egyptian bellydancer I could say that she dances respecting the traditional style, she only performs in Festivals, and this is Dandash (soon I will upload info about her).
Madam Sahar Zaki (sister of Sohair Zaki) told me once that Sohair said: "BellyDance has died in Egypt" and she encoraged me to continous my Couses telling me that all what I teach is the traditional style, and I should keep going on. This is why I am trying to do something about it, to help to clean up the bad image of BellyDance inside my possibilities.
This Blog is not focus in discussing the BellyDancers styles, is only focus in letting everyone around the world to know which are the different Egyptian BellyDancers since we have video record, and their own styles and fashions they created, for those out of Egypt to be able to evaluate the dance style they want to watch, study or perform.
Thanks for following my posts.
Please write me a private messege if you see any problem through the blog. Thanks! :)
In actual fact, are more Traditional Egyptian BellyDancers Style the old fashion foreigner teachers living abrod of Egypt, those dancers who travelled to Egypt to learn from the Masters Egyptian teachers of the 70's & 80's, when Internet was not still hapenning. Those foreigner bellydancers are not considered back in their country as good dancers or teachers as the nowadays Egyptians, but in reality are highly respecting the Traditional rules of BellyDance.
In 2008 I was working as the BellyDancer of the at the Sheraton 5* Hotel-Resort in Sharm El Sheikh (EGYPT), and the artist director told me once: "Foreigners will save BellyDance in Egypt" and I think he was right.
Ironically, those foreigner are the ones that started to promote back in their countries BellyDance, and thanks to them, now everyone in the World know about this dance; but they are not considered by the none of the Festivals an attraction to learn from them, instead they preffer to bring Egyptian bellydancers who are not anymore dancing traditional style.
This is why I reccomend to all my students that if they want to go to a BellyDance Festival, go to learn from the legends: Sohair Zaki, Mona Said, Nagwa Fouad or Fifi Abdou. There is only one Egyptian bellydancer I could say that she dances respecting the traditional style, she only performs in Festivals, and this is Dandash (soon I will upload info about her).
Madam Sahar Zaki (sister of Sohair Zaki) told me once that Sohair said: "BellyDance has died in Egypt" and she encoraged me to continous my Couses telling me that all what I teach is the traditional style, and I should keep going on. This is why I am trying to do something about it, to help to clean up the bad image of BellyDance inside my possibilities.
This Blog is not focus in discussing the BellyDancers styles, is only focus in letting everyone around the world to know which are the different Egyptian BellyDancers since we have video record, and their own styles and fashions they created, for those out of Egypt to be able to evaluate the dance style they want to watch, study or perform.
Thanks for following my posts.
Please write me a private messege if you see any problem through the blog. Thanks! :)
I agreed with your post and I think you and the dancers you have posted are true Egyptian style belly dancers. However I am disappointed that you seem to assume having large breasts is somehow a new style and equals a bad dancer. There are large breasted women such as myself who enjoy classic Egyptian raqs sharqi and raqs baladi. Don't put us in the same category as the disrespectful belly dancers.
ReplyDeleteI didn't assume that natural large breast are disrespectful dancers, I said that seems that nowadays must be a large breast instead of natural breast. Because of this nowadays fashion many BellyDancers has gone to surgery.
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