Motions of the Ocean – Xander Parish and The Mariinsky Ballet Company perform at PER AQUUM Huvafen Fushi

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 ‘Let us read, and let us dance.  These two amusements will never do any harm to the world’, Voltaire.

We have always been dancers. Ever since the beginning of time. From ballet to hip hop, jazz, to waltz to the two-step, dancing has always been a way of expression. Dancing and music have proved that communication by words is not always what’s cracked up to be, but the genuine movements of two persons are enough to express what needs to be said between the two. It is romantic, it is deep and it has always delivered.

‘The dance is a poem of which each movement is a word’

It is about breaking away from the norm, creating something new. A form of art, to be able to deliver a message so powerful, to communicate with the audience without uttering a word. And last week at Huvafen Fushi by PER AQUUM, Xander Parish, and the Mariinsky Theater ballet performers did just that.

The stage was set with the blue lagoon as a backdrop. The professional dancers, two by two appeared on stage delivering staggering performances of different scenes from different plays.

The night began with the scene 2 of Swan Lake. Choreographed by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov, and revised by Konstantin Sergeyev. Dancers Kateryna Chebykina and Xander Parish himself graced the stage. The couple moved to the powerful music composed by the great IIyich Tchaikovsky. Portraying the scene when the young prince meets Odette, the swan for the first time. I sat completely mesmerized watching them move.

Scene after scene from classical ballet performances such as Carmen-Suite, Chopiniana, The Nutcracker, Scheherazade, Giselle, Le Corsaire, and Don Quixote, the professional dancers delivered touching, and beautiful scenes.

‘To watch us dance is to hear our hearts speak’.

I had never seen anyone perform ballet before, and this was an extremely touching moment for me. The elegance with which the way they moved told stories of years and years of practice, the failed attempts, and the successful ones.

The movements grasping the audience, their expressions telling stories of sad, and tortured souls. I wouldn’t be lying if I admitted that I wept a tear during the last scene of Swan Lake.

The fluidity of Kateryna Chebykina as she delivered the scene with incredible soul and passion took the audience on her journey of anguish. She moved elegantly, flapping her wings, fast and desperate until slowly accepting defeat and sinking to the ground in despair. Every move, oozing raw emotion.

 ‘Motions of the Ocean, as the event was dubbed, proved a great success. “Classical ballet is one of Russia’s finest cultural treasures, but it’s not something that immediately comes to mind when you think of the Maldives… until now,” Xander said.

The dancers swapped the St Peterburg’s Theatre Square for a tropical beach backdrop as part of PULSE, PER AQUUM Hotels & Resorts’ commitment to delivering one-of-a-kind immersive experiences to their guests – and deliver they did, leaving the audience captivated by their soulful performances.

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