Amira

Amira, a native of Prague, Czech Republic, lives and performs mostly in Tokyo, Japan. Amira has been following her goal of becoming a professional dancer in the most straightforward manner possible: she has been studying oriental dance with the world most recognized Master Teachers of this art. Her first teacher Karima from Tokyo is the very first Japanese national who performed as a solo artist in Cairo, Egypt. She remains the only Japanese between the precious foreign "Roses" in Mr. Mahmoud Reda Troupe. As a soloist, she performed in four stars venues in Cairo where she mixed in with other foreign artists. In her classes Amira mastered basics of Egyptian style, acquired fundamental dance routine and adopted an unshakable awareness that belly dance originates in Arab folk dance, and thus, congenitally, is not „an art of allurement“, as it is wrongly perceived.

Since 1997 Amira has participated in classes with an inimitable dancer and ingenious choreographer Sa´dia Camille, with a four year hiatus from the classes due having to be in Europe. Sa´dia Camille performs and teaches in Japan, the Middle East and the U.S.A. Being a winner of Bellydancer of the Year competition, Sa´dia has nurtured many of her followers, who are prizewinners in the competition, and perform in four stars Cairo venues and in Ahlan Wa Sahlan festival evening galas. Sa´dia has been instrumental in the all-round development of Amira as a dancer, she has influenced her dance style to a great degree, and assisted on her way to solo performing career.

In addition to regular classes, Amira has continuously taken high-level workshops with first-class Egyptian as well as foreign stars and celebrities, who stop in Tokyo on their world tours. These include the following Master Teachers: Mme. Raqia Hassan (Eg.), Aida Nour (Eg.), Farida Fahmi (Eg.), Mahmoud Reda (Eg.), Samasam (Sweden), Deyana Mahiou (France), Shareen el Safy (U.S.A.), Sahra Saeeda (U.S.A.), Dr. Mo Geddawi (Eg.), Magdy al Lithy (Eg.), Hesham Saleh (Eg.). For most of them Amira was their first Czech student and in many cases she remains the only dancer from Czech Republic who has learned with these highly prominent artists.

Thanks to her serious and loyal approach to the study of dance and many opportunities to learn with world-famous celebrities of raqs sharqi Amira gained a high level of understanding to the dance of The East. She was allowed to teach it, and again, she is the only Czech instructor, who has attained a valid teachers licence, and a warm approval to perform and to teach from two of her Master Teachers. Amira feels that her demanding education, and certification is a vital prerequisite of fully qualified teaching, which besides of physical aspects of training provides students also with knowledge of and respect for cultural values, which is an essential and indispensable condition of raqs sharqi apprehension.

Amira recognizes the only truly genuine dance education is an education through personal experience during lessons with masters of the dance form. That is the reason she relentlessly continues to oppose amateurism, although it still prevails in many corners of the world.

For a majority of Czech professional instructors, Amira shows a way to good practice and is forging ahead of them. She has informed Czech dance professionals about the existence of abundant styles of belly dance, as well as the multitude of arabic music rhythms, which caused them to study the art form more in depth, and to gradually differentiate their courses. She has also established notions regarding styles (eg. raqs sharqi, dance of The East, Egyptian style, tabla solo, raqs assaya, ghawazee, melaya luff, raqs tabiri). Amira has revealed her passion for Egyptian style dancing, and many dancers including Liza Vegra have followed her example.

Amira, as one of few belly dance instructors with active language skills, and with personal contacts world-wide, has provided information about important events on the oriental dance and music scene in Egypt, and western Europe in Czech language. Back in 2001 she published links to several gifted raqs teachers in Europe, between them also to a studio of Beata and Horacio Cifuentes, famous dancers and master instructors in Berlin, Germany, whom she knows from their workshops and shows in Tokyo. Since then, their studio is frequented by professional as well as amateur instructors from Czech Republic. Amira is very well known for her sincere and whole-hearted conduct. Due to her character, she has become an invaluable consultant of T.Schel, the owner of Center of Oriental Dance (presently the Center of Dance), during the expansion of his business activities in this amateur company.

Amira has mastered several styles of oriental dancing. She has introduced some of them for the first time in Czech Republic. Her repertoire is indeed very wide; the pieces vary in dance styles and expression, with their number reaching as many as twenty. In 2007 she presented a dance show in Prague, in which she performed seven solos, each of them in different style, which is a quite unique achievement both in Czech as well as in the world.

Amira has designed Orientace performance as a Journey of a dancer around the World. Visiting of all continents through dance gave audiences a possibility to compare dances from geographically distant places. Amira chose one dance to represent each continent and coupled it with one splendid Egyptian or Middle Eastern dance. Her matching of dances was quite successful, apart from obvious choice based on costume similarities or geographical closeness of the cultures, first because she chose pairs of dances which had similarities due to the adoption of some movements, one to the other,  and therefore commonality of movements, and secondly because of similarities in the mood or purpose of the dance. The word "Orientace" means orientation in English. Through this performance Amira helped the audience and Czech public to find their bearings in the world of dance as well as in the world of Oriental Dance.

Amira continues to advocate professionalism in oriental dance, and to promote  Egyptian style as one of few authentic and legitimite stream of raqs. Amira works as an instructor in the most prestigious dance studio in central Tokyo.