There's A Mermaid Diving World Cup, And A S'porean Competed In It

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There really is a World Cup for everything these days.

Football? Of course. Mermaid diving? Apparently so.

The inaugural CMAS Mermaid Diving World Cup was recently held in Hainan, with competitors from 12 countries and regions putting on their tails and taking to the water.

And there was a Singapore representative taking part too.

Professional mermaid instructor Yean Muk, better known online as Muroro Yean, was Singapore's sole competitor at the event after another Singaporean entrant, Aliyah, fell ill and had to withdraw.

And before you dismiss this as people putting on sparkly tails and swimming around looking pretty, Yean would like you to know there's considerably more to it than that.

"One common misconception is that being a mermaid is simply putting on a tail, jumping into the water and taking beautiful photos effortlessly," she tells 8days.sg.

Behind those few graceful minutes underwater, she says, “Is a lot of sweat, effort and sometimes even tears".

We blame it on Ariel from The Little Mermaid who made it look so easy.

Yean, a certified MFI Mermaid Instructor and founder of Yean Mermaid House, competed in two categories, finishing 22nd out of 37 in Mermaid Skills and 20th out of 39 in Mermaid Dance. It was her first international Mermaid Diving World Cup.

So what exactly do you do at a Mermaid World Cup?

Think synchronised swimming meets underwater dance, of course, with considerably more tail.

In Mermaid Skills, Yean had to complete 12 required skills, while Mermaid Dance involved performing a choreographed routine to music, complete with a character and storyline.

"It's almost like performing in a drama underwater. You know the song, the timing and the story, so when you dive down, you perform each movement according to the music and the character you're portraying,” she explains.

Yean estimates she was underwater for around two minutes in her three-minute Skills routine, while more than two minutes of her nearly three-minute Dance routine was spent underwater.

That's cumulative underwater time, and Yean surfaces throughout and performs recovery breathing before continuing.

Then there's performing with both legs inside a giant tail.

Yean's competition tail and fin weigh around 3kg altogether, and that's before everything gets wet.

The tail costs around S$150, or approximately S$200 with her costume and accessories.

So after all that training, what tripped her up during the World Cup? Her fake nails.

Long fake nails were part of her Mermaid Dance character, but Yean had trouble putting them on during her performance and lost precious time.

"If there's one thing I would do differently next time, I would prepare even more for the small details, especially my costume and accessories. I learnt that even something as small as a fake nail can affect the timing of a performance!" she says.

Imagine training your core, breath control and underwater choreography, only to get sabo-ed by a manicure.

Yean says what surprised her most in Hainan was how seriously competitive "mermaiding" has developed.

"It's not seen as just dressing up as a mermaid. There is a competitive side, an artistic side and a performance side," she says.

"Mermaiding is still relatively niche in Singapore," says Yean, who hopes there will eventually be more opportunities and spaces here for mermaids to train, perform and compete internationally.

Yean also tells us she hopes to compete at the World Cup again.

How did she feel representing Singapore?

"Stress! It really hit me when the plane took off. I remember thinking, 'Wow, I'm really flying to Hainan to compete at a Mermaid World Cup as a mermaid from Singapore’,” she says.

So the next time someone tells you they're a competitive mermaid, they might just be training for the next World Cup.