AMMAN — At 27, Jordanian bodybuilder Dana Soumbouloglou has been shouldering the
weight of taboo and backlash for the better part of a decade. But the
strongwoman remains steadfast, gunning straight for her dream to participate in
Ms. Olympia.
اضافة اعلان
“I have been
in love with sports since I was a kid, having done Taekwondo, swimming,
gymnastics, football, handball, and ballet. But bodybuilding is my passion, I
cannot describe it, it helps me exorcize all the negative energy in my body and
boosts my self-esteem,” Soumbouloglou told Jordan News in an interview.
The athlete traced
her passion for bodybuilding back to 2012 in Greece, where she was pursuing a
degree in media and journalism.
“I signed up
for a gym and while out walking with my father, I watched a bodybuilder walk
down the street. She was my motivation to follow my ambition,” Soumbouloglou said.
“My father has accepted this crazy
notion of me being a bodybuilder, but I struggled for a long time with my
mother until she understood that this sport was my passion.”
But it was
not only Soumbouloglou’s mother who took issue with her involvement in such a
male-dominated sport.
“A lot of my
relatives were against me but that was not (enough of) a hurdle to stop me from
marching towards my goal and passion,” she explained.
Soumbouloglou
also receives the occasional comment from random passersby on the street. Someone
once asked: “Why have you turned yourself in to a man?”
“I remember
receiving a message from a girl saying: ‘If I had a body like yours, I would
kill myself,’” she said. Even official bodies have opposed the athlete,
according to Soumbouloglou.
There have
been other comments about and scrutiny of her physique, but at the end of the
day, “It is a sport, it has nothing to do with men or manhood,” she said. The bodybuilder
is now looking to go pro outside of Jordan.
“I have
participated in several championships and I am now trying to get my pro card to
take part in the biggest one — Ms. Olympia — after the Jordanian Bodybuilding
and Fitness Federation rejected me on the pretext of breaking tradition,” said
Soumbouloglou. “Aside from me being the only Jordanian woman who plays the
sport — I do not have any competition in my own country.”
President of the
Jordanian Bodybuilding and Fitness Federation, Mamoun Kalimat, denied claims
that the federation has refused to take in Soumbouloglou or
any other athlete; telling Jordan News: “The athlete, Dana, has not submitted an official request to the Jordanian Bodybuilding and Fitness
Federation for assistance,” Kalimat said, pointing out that “our doors are open
to all athletes within the [boundaries of] rules and regulations.”
He went on
to explain that “It would be very difficult to establish a base of women
bodybuilders in Jordan as our society is very conservative of its traditions,
but laws and regulations do not prohibit it.”
The bodybuilder
currently works seven days a week at a unisex gym in order to cover the high
cost of pursuing her dream. Training and dieting expenses can exceed $30,000 a
year, and that number is likely to double when it comes time to participate in
championships, according to Soumbouloglou.
Soumbouloglou
also criticized an absence of support from local companies. Although she has
been honing her craft for almost 10 years, she has only ever received one
sponsorship offer, which she said was “not nearly enough” to cover expenses.
“Every girl
needs to fight for her goal and walk the path that makes her happy, because what’s
the point of living life without a goal?”
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