Per Markussen of Norway
When Per Markussen decided to come to Romania, his family and friends from Norway asked him what drew him to a country that Scandinavians knew so little about. And once he was in Bucharest his Romanian friends wanted to know why he chose to come to Romania. Per Markussen, one of the most famous international fitness trainers of the moment, gives us the answer:
Roxana Vasile, 26.03.2015, 13:59
When Per Markussen decided to come to Romania, his family and friends from Norway asked him what drew him to a country that Scandinavians knew so little about. And once he was in Bucharest his Romanian friends wanted to know why he chose to come to Romania. Per Markussen, one of the most famous international fitness trainers of the moment, gives us the answer:
“I am here because of an opportunity I got 4 years ago regarding work. When I got this opportunity I was thinking about it very shortly and I decided to take it, to take this opportunity and do it because I am also very curious as a person.”
Unlike Norway, where doing sports is part of people’s daily routine, in Romania people are less eager to exercise regularly, which makes Per Markussen’s decision to leave his native country all the more curious.
“That is one of the things, because of this I thought that I had a lot of things to give and to do and also exchange. Because I could also learn the other way around from here. In Scandinavia it’s very general that people have an active life style. Skiing is like a national sports. So for us this activity has been, it’s very cultural and we really appreciate this, we really appreciate the nature, and being out in the nature, we are very proud of our nature and here it’s in a different way. Here you have fantastic athletes like in the Olympics, in gymnastics and weightlifting, and these things. And we don’t have that in Scandinavia, it’s shifted in a way. I have seen for the last years, since I came here 4 years ago, that this is changing. It’s really changing now and we can see that also the knowledge of people in general starting to blossom that the importance of being active for health, and for everything, for the mood and for feeling good. But it takes time because you have a lot of people that are not maybe so into this, could be from interest or information or whatever, and this is what we are working on, to get the knowledge out there and make people understand and feel also the difference of being active versus inactive. “
In Bucharest Per Markussen holds dance fitness classes based on step, aerobic, house and hip-hop moves. The atmosphere during his classes is great.
“I really enjoyed to work with people and be with people and I see myself like fish in the water when I teach. I love it, I totally love it, and today I have the same motivation and inspiration as I had when I started with this 20 years ago. In Scandinavia people tend to be a little bit more optimistic and positive on the views of life, in general. I can see there is a small difference here, so when I came here, when I started with these classes I think the first comment I got from my first class, my first class was a Wednesday class, it was a dance class here, one girl came to me and said ‘Oh, wow, I had never any idea that you could have fun while training and feel this good. And that says it, it’s about this. “
Per Markussen travels a lot both in Romania and abroad to hold fitness instructor courses. Together with Spanish Julio Papi, another renowned fitness trainer, he runs the biggest fitness school in Romania called “Move on”.
“We work together with this and we cover all the areas of fitness, and we can say well being, and we go in full force with teaching all these different disciplines and always try to stay on top of our games, with having educations and events together. So we work all in Romania and now our school is working internationally so we are invited to other countries to do educations in other countries, we have training for beginners who want to become group fitness instructors or a personal trainer or a cycling instructor. They come to us and we take them to the education, we educate them, and they have to pass exams to be licensed instructors. And then we have educations for already-instructors in different levels, mixed level, second level, third level, and so forth. Many different levels in the way of teaching. That’s why we need to, me and Julio and the rest of our team, we really need to be on top of our game, I’m exploring what’s going on in the world and being up to date with all educations because this world of physical activity changes a lot.”
4 years ago, when Per Markussen came to Romania, the level of Romanian fitness instructors was inferior to that of Norwegian instructors and there were no modern training methods. In time, things have changed fro the better, also thanks to Per’s work.
“The level in Romania of trainers it’s going so fast and now we actually have for the first time in Romania we have international trainers, international presenters. Which means that the level has reached such a high standard that these people are being invited to other countries to teach and that is such a big leap and it’s amazing.
“I love Romania, I love its people, I love the difference. When I came here I was lost a little bit, I didn’t know how to act in this environment. I knew about Dracula, and that’s about it. First of all I came here in the middle of the summer, I was kaput for one month in July, it was so hard for me. When you see birds sitting and they were so hot that their wings were out to the side, I was like that. And it was so hard for me just to get accustomed to the climate but I loved it. And long hot summer nights and new people to meet, starting to learn how people communicate, and what this means and this means…and masculine, feminine…all the differences aside, and how the society works.”
Per admits that he still has a lot more to learn but he is persevering. He sees himself living and training in Romania in the coming years as well, the more so as he has big professional plans in store.
