A women-only meeting on the Costa to share experiences

The idea of female-only clubs started in the late 1800s. The first was opened in the USA. More than a century later, women are increasingly seeking out other women's company as well. All-female clubs in the world show that women have become less competitive with each other, and more embracing.

Three Nerja women – an Irish psychologist, a Dutch singer and coach, and a Finnish musician – gathered English-speaking women together with the idea to create a space where psychology and music are combined to make them feel at home and with others who can understand them easily as they have the same experiences.

The first meeting took place at Los Huertos del Sevillano in the town where women were able to have deeper conversation and small talks with other foreign women who are resident or just spend winters or summers in this part of the Costa del Sol.

The psychologist, Aisling Murphy, stressed that women need to know that others are rooting for them, that others relate to their struggles, that their experiences, thoughts, and feelings are valid. It is possible to gain harmony through talks, sharing experiences as well as via songs with a deeper meaning.

Dutch singer and coach Malou Swart has a passion for both music and inner growth. Malou is also very passionate about singing which she considers as a way to express herself, her own emotions and to connect with herself as well as to others.

“For some women it is not easy to stand up for themselves, to set boundaries or be honest about their needs. Women, especially, prefer to be quiet instead of giving their opinion. Adjusting permanently to others becomes their routine. I think such all-female meetings will help such women to find their voice in that sense and thereby understand more about themselves, and regain their authenticity,” Malou told SUR in English.

At the women's night Malou performed and shared her personal experience in relocating, starting a business, see children grow up in a still foreign environment which can be easily be yours. Maria Hyväri from Finland added more penetrating emotions through playing violin. She is sure that singing and music have a therapeutic effect. Having moved from Lapland to Nerja, Maria had a lot to contribute to the meeting topic – 'into the light, emerging from the darkness.'

The same night the inauguration of an exhibition was held. The artist Sergey Son is known for his powerful, large-scale paintings of the female body. The forms he paints are mostly dramatic instead of flawless and pretty. Sergey Son paints women in fresh pastel colours that evoke feelings of admiration, love, and family warmth. His women dance, read or take a stroll in a field of flowers or on the beach in Galicia. However, some female figures are painted in quite dull colours though they harmonise with each other like notes in music. The local restaurateur Joaquin 'Sevillano' offered a room of his Los Huertos restaurant and welcomed the women who attended the meeting with a variety of tapas.

The meeting might be a first step for establishing an all-female club which already has a name. It is HEÆLS, the Scandinavian letter Æ (containing A and E) means the word can be read as 'heels' or 'heals'. Women are still associated with high-heeled. At the same time, such meetings, offering various ways to feel more secure in society, can heal, or rather, help with well-being.