Soneva Stars

Soneva Jani: March 1-31, 2023 Soneva Fushi: April 1-30, 2023 During her 15-year career, Hortensia has collaborated with the UN, Olympics Sports Federations and several private clinics. She has a Master’s in Osteopathy and degrees in Sports Education and Physiotherapy. Originally focused on a traditional osteopathic approach to treating sports injuries, Hortensia’s methodology evolved to reflect evidence that stress, emotions and unchanneled trauma have a direct impact on the body. She works closely with you to get to the root of your concerns, using a unique, multi-pronged approach that combines traditional osteopathy with her deep knowledge of the body’s biodynamic, skeletal, muscular and craniosacral systems.  

Dr Katherine PT, DPT, OCS, CFMT, CSCS, is an experienced physiotherapist and expert in realigning and rebalancing the body. Her treatment philosophy focuses on patient-centred work, optimising functional movement through manual therapy and a targeted exercise rehabilitation approach. She has worked across the world helping patients with chronic injuries and spinal dysfunction, as well as a special focus on the pelvic girdle.

As part of our ongoing commitment to ensuring that our younger guests stay inspired and intrigued, Soneva aims to help visiting children and teenagers feel fully supported outside of term-time. We have partnered with Oppidan Education, a British-based mentoring firm created to help children continue their learning outside of the classroom and reach their full potential. As well as complimentary drop-in workshops with fun, educational activities, Oppidan will also offer private, one-on-one appointments, which can be scheduled each afternoon at an additional fee.

Michael Wignall’s experience of freshly cooked and multi-cultural cuisine started at a young age, traveling extensively from the Far East, to the United States and across Europe. Although exposed to a variety of international gastronomy, aspiring to be a top chef was not Michael’s first passion. As a teen, Michael had a promising career as a professional BMX biker, however, his parents encouraged him to attend catering college. After three years, Michael moved to Spain to experience front of house, authentic cooking and the cuisine the country had to offer. Michael’s professional career started at Broughton Park in the UK under Paul Heathcote. Since then Michael has headed several restaurants earning them Michelin stars. Michael held two Michelin stars and five AA rosettes at Gidleigh Park in Chagford, Devon, and at The Latymer at Pennyhill Park in Bagshot, Surrey. He then purchased The Angel at Hetton in 2018, which is set in the Yorkshire Dales National Park and gained a Michelin star in its first year of opening. Michael produces incredibly complex, technical accomplished dishes. His attention to detail and dedication to the pursuit of perfection in flavour, texture and appearance knows no bounds. He has a passion for traveling the world to find new inspirations and ideas to pair with locally sourced, British produce.

Hailed as one of the best football freestylers in the world, Marcel Gurk is the current German champion, holds ten Guinness World Records and is the author of the world’s first book on football freestyling. He made it to the semifinal of Germany’s Got Talent, Das Supertalent, and travels around the world sharing his unique skills. Having studied sport and media management in Dusseldorf, Marcel also specialises in working with children and has designed his own unique concept to help take his students’ skills to the next level. While in the Maldives, he will be hosting football freestyling workshops for Young Sonevians at Soneva Fushi and Soneva Jani.

Jonas Björkman is the former World No. 4 in singles, and World No. 1 in doubles tennis. He retired from professional tennis in 2008, after achieving six singles titles and 54 doubles titles (including nine Grand Slam wins) and is among a small group who has managed to win all four Grand Slam events. After five years as the Marketing Director of the Stockholm Open tennis tournament, he started his coaching career, with Andy Murray in 2015 and with Marin Cilic in 2016 and 2017. Today he works for Eurosport as a tennis commentator and coaches Swedish No. 2 and WTA player, Mirjam Bjorklund. Since February 2021, Jonas has been captain of Sweden’s men’s national padel team.

Roger has been a key figure in the wellness sector for more than three decades. Named in Tatler’s ‘Best of the Best’ guide as ‘one of the top 8 therapists worth travelling around the globe for’, he conducts therapies, seminars and workshops around the world in energy work, spiritual healing, profound emotional recovery and growth. Roger’s unique approach combines science, medicine, Eastern wellness philosophies, psychotherapeutics and spirituality – working with you to create a whole-person, grounded and integrative pathway to wellbeing, health and a joyful existence.  

Frederic Van Tricht was born into a family of cheese experts. Forty-eight years ago, his grandfather Pieter Van Tricht opened up a gourmet shop with a great cheese selection in Antwerp, Belgium. When his son Michel took over the family business in 1978, he nurtured his passion for cheese, travelling to the best cheese affineurs (maturers) and artisanal producers across Europe. Selecting only the finest raw milk, artisan cheese, Kaasa Affineurs Van Tricht (Cheese Affineurs Van Tricht) gained an impressive reputation among Antwerp’s culinary community, supplying the finest restaurants in and around the city. Today, the company supplies nearly all Michelin-starred restaurants in Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxemburg and Ireland, and has been named ‘Europe’s best cheese shop’ by The New York Times. Frederic Van Tricht joined the business while studying to become a chef, helping out with the wholesale side of the company and working in the shop for an entire year before his father Michel let him come on board. Today, he oversees the day-to-day management of the wholesale business, curating an exceptional collection of the finest artisan cheeses from farmers and small businesses and working with chefs and restaurants across the world. His background as a chef enables him to find the perfect pairing of cheese for every dish, and also gives him the creativity to experiment in collaboration with his customers. Frederic’s favourite cheeses are Stilton and Roquefort.

Jamie first discovered his passion for food at 17 while working in a local bakery. Waking up at the crack of dawn to make bread, he became fascinated with sourcing quality raw ingredients and discovering the processes that culminated in a perfect loaf of bread. He then went on to work at Gordon Ramsey’s Michelin-starred Maze in London, followed by its sister restaurant in Melbourne. The wild and local food movement in Copenhagen drew him to work for Paul Cunningham and later to become head chef at Kødbyens Fiskebar, where he currently serves fine dining in a relaxed atmosphere. At Kødbyens Fiskebar, it all starts with fresh and raw ingredients, which are locally sourced and depict the season of Scandinavia. Seasonal vegetables arrive in the morning from a biodynamic farm north of Copenhagen and the forager supplies forest herbs. The restaurant moves hand in hand with the fishmongers and guarantees only sustainable fish caught inshore on a small scale. The oysters are wild European from the oyster banks of Limfjord in Denmark, which are delivered every morning.

Dr Erika Palmerio is a heliophysicist at Predictive Science Inc., a research company based in San Diego, California. Her research focuses on the sun, its eruptions and the effects of its activity on the solar system. Her primary research topics are centred on coronal mass ejections (CMEs), huge eruptions of plasma and magnetic fields that are regularly expelled from the sun and major drivers of magnetic storms on Earth and solar energetic particles (SEPs). She also provides regular space weather updates on Twitter at @erikapal.  Dr Benjamin Lynch is a solar physics researcher at the Space Sciences Laboratory of the University of California–Berkeley. His primary research interests include numerical modelling of solar flares and CME initiation in the solar corona, the onset and evolution of magnetic reconnection in space plasmas, and using multi-wavelength and multi-spacecraft observational data to validate the modelling results. In addition, he has worked on the formation of reconnection-generated transients at the boundaries of coronal streamers and pseudostreamers as one of the main sources of the observed variability in the slow solar wind, as well as extending solar models of flares and CMEs to other active stars and characterizing the impact these may have on the potential habitability of exoplanets.  During their visit, Dr Erika and Dr Benjamin will be hosting daytime solar observation sessions, together with nighttime stargazing sessions and talks about solar physics and space weather. They will be at Soneva Fushi and Soneva Jani in the Maldives during April 5–12, 2023.

Lars Lindberg Christensen is an award-winning astronomer and science communicator. He has authored a dozen popular science books translated into more than ten languages. Lars has directed more than 10 documentaries and planetarium movies that have received critical acclaim around the world. He is responsible for the communication and education for NSF’s NOIRLab consisting of Cerro Tololo, CSDC, Gemini, Kitt Peak and Rubin Observatory. Lars has more than 200 publications to his credit, most of them in popular science communication and its theory. Lars received the 2021 Klumpke-Roberts Award and the Tycho Brahe Medal in 2005 for his achievements in science communication and has been credited with leading the most successful outreach efforts in ESO’s history. During his visit, Lars will be hosting after-dinner stargazing sessions, along with talks about astronomy throughout the day. He will be at Soneva Fushi and Soneva Jani in the Maldives from April 6 to April 16, 2023.

Hailing from Sweden, Kristin Kaspersen has been interested in wellness since she was a young girl. The television host, author and entrepreneur completed her first yoga teacher training programme in the year 2000. Since then, she’s authored five best-selling books on health and wellbeing. She has a deep interest in coaching and leadership and uses her gained knowledge to help loved ones through loss, grief and changes in close relationships. Kristin’s podcast, Kristin Kaspersen Nyfiken På (Curious Kristin Kaspersen), is based upon her conversations with the wide variety of people she meets, delving into their knowledge and life experiences. Teaching her own take on Yinyoga, Kristin practices yoga and stretches every morning to wake her body and nervous system for the day ahead. While at Soneva, she will be hosting a series of morning yoga classes and Soma Move classes and sessions that reveal the importance of starting the day with yoga to manage stress, increase energy levels and prevent injury.