Hips Don’t Lie: we hear from belly dancer Marija Zinkevica about the upcoming Belly Dance Festival and building connection with the body through dance

Dancing is such a joyful human activity. Like singing, music or other performative arts, the graceful expression and coordination of this artform taps into an almost transcendent part of human behaviour, so much so that it can seem like a gift bestowed upon a special few. Of course behind the talent lies hours of training, a gradual building of confidence, and probably a few trips and falls. 

I stepped into one of Marija’s classes for the first time in 2023, having no previous dance experience, other than completing a very rudimentary GCSE taught by my school rugby teacher two decades ago. Filled with around twenty women of diverse ages, shapes, sizes, and skill level, by the time an hour was up we’d stretched, sweated, shimmied, and learnt some steps to a basic choreo routine. As someone who balks at the idea of gyms and jogging, and still has to often take a moment to decipher my left from my right, I was mildly impressed with how much I’d enjoyed my attempt at dancing, and vowed to go back.

Fast forward two years, and I'm certainly nowhere near perfect, but along with finessing some of the moves, I've found there's much to be gained by patiently persevering, turning off my mind for a while and developing a new connection with my body.

“Don’t think, just dance,” is one of the instructions Marija regularly gives in her classes, advice which hits in numerous ways as a student. Too much thinking spoils the broth - clearly, dance can be taught, but to become fluent there’s a need to disconnect part of the brain. Spending time in that special space of focus, movement and detachment is one of the more therapeutic aspects of dance.

“When women come to my classes, they often say for that hour they don’t think about anything that was in their day,” Marija explains. “It happens to me - sometimes I come in to teach after a terrible day, but ten minutes in I’ve forgotten what happened. You’re focussed on the steps and relaxing into your body. Some people don’t come to perform, they just come for that.”

Marija maintains that anyone can dance, but admits it is harder for adults to get started as dance schools often focus on kids of parents with deep pockets. Her classes however are a welcoming space for all women. 

“I think the oldest person I had was 84, and she was one of my regulars. We have teenagers as well, or mums that bring their kids,” she tells me. “Some girls just moved to Nottingham, others are in their twenties or thirties when it can be hard to make new friends. So it’s a good way to meet people. My advanced group has been together for a year now and none of us knew each other obviously before, but it's become quite a safe space to just talk about anything.”

Dating back over 6000 years, belly dance is considered one of the oldest forms of dancing in the world and is characterised by flowy movements along with distinct isolations of the hips and chest. It’s been suggested that it has origins in Pagan fertility rituals to prepare a woman’s body for childbirth, and would be performed by women, for women. 

While the roots have never been firmly documented, over time different cultures have weaved threads of their own customs and styles into the dance. Originating in the Middle East, the Western term ‘belly dance’ was coined by French travellers to Egypt in the 18th century. The traditional Egyptian style, Raqs Baladi, was danced socially, during celebrations and gatherings, and eventually evolved into more of a performance, Raqs Sharqi, or ‘dance of the east’.  

 “Many belly dancers are not Arabic, because even though it originated there, in Egypt dancing like that is not as acceptable for women,” says Marija, adding “but here, it’s for the woman herself. It is still sexualised, but you can be sexy - that’s fine. It’s feminine and powerful, and it’s not for the men.”

Marija first tried belly dancing at age eleven. Originally from Latvia, it was her mother who first began taking classes to keep fit. “I was doing ballroom and traditional dancing a little bit at school, so she brought me to class with her because I liked dancing all the time. But I was the only kid there, everyone was in their 40s or 50s.”

A few years later, Marija’s family moved to the UK, but it wasn’t until she was studying Computer Science at University of Nottingham that she joined the UoN Belly Dance Society and began dancing more seriously. “I started trying my own routines, and bit by bit I began teaching,” she explains. “It was when I realised I enjoyed giving back and seeing the girls progress that I first started doing classes in Nottingham.”

In recent years she’s noticed a rise in popularity of belly dancing in the UK. After working as a consultant in software engineering for a decade, it was only towards the end of 2024 that Marija took the plunge and began teaching full time. “I didn't want to get to seventy and think, ‘Oh I should have tried. I should have done it’,” she explains. “Last year, I made a decision to work on myself and say yes to literally every single thing. I thought, ‘Okay, let's figure out if I'm actually good’. So I've been to four different countries, in five different competitions, and I got a medal in everything that I entered.”

Specialising in Egyptian dance, Marija developed a particular penchant for drum solos after seeing Polish dancer Jasirah perform in 2017 and has built up her skills from there. “That’s where I first fell in love with it. It’s got isolations, shimmies, everything. I copied her routine off YouTube, and practiced it back to back.”

The movements of professional belly dance are certainly impressive, but it’s not purely about performance. “The main thing people get out of it is confidence. It’s not always fast, but it comes. You can learn a figure of eight or a shimmy and begin layering other moves, and gradually you think, ‘Oh yeah, I can do that’,” Marija explains. “You start looking at yourself in the mirror and liking what you do. You walk better, have better posture, and then and then that mentality comes into your life and you start appreciating your body more.”

 Since 2023, Marija has been organising Haflas - informal events where belly dancers can perform and showcase their skills - for her students. This year, she decided to go a step further and host the Hips Don’t Lie Belly Dance Festival, a two day event with performers from all over the world coming to the Albert Hall to showcase and teach their skills. 

“Usually if you want to learn from the best you have to go to London, so this is a unique thing for Nottingham,” Marija says. “There will be classes in the day and a gala show in the evening that anyone can attend. We’re bringing over some international stars, like Jasirah from Poland and David Abraham from Argentina, who tour the world with their workshops. To see them perform on stage is just mind-blowing, so to bring that to Nottingham is brilliant.”

The Hips Don’t Lie Belly Dance Gala Show takes place on Saturday 1 March 2025 at the Albert Hall, Nottingham. To book tickets head to marijabellydance.com/hdl2025

@marijabellydance