Best of the Maldives Online: Videos – Dreaming of Maldives

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Dreamin of the Maldives videos

Facebook, Twitter, Forums, Foursquare…all of this look a social media and I have not yet looked at one of the big ones, YouTube.

As it happens, the best eye to Maldivian spectacle has expanded his lens from photography to videography recently. Sakis Papadolpolous now has a collection of video vignettes for resorts he has produced available not just on his own Dreaming of Maldives site, but also on Vimeo and his own YouTube channel. They are simply the best resort videos going. Sakis does produce some seriously beautiful staged ‘mood’ shots to highlight a languid hammock or a tantalising cocktail. But he also includes plemty of panoramic material which provides a good perspective on the look and feel of the landscape itself and facility itself.

Since the inception, I have included a video of the resort in the main Profile page if there was a decent video available on YouTube. I limited myself to YouTube do to the ease of embedding into the Profile page. I limited myself to’decent’ because I loathe those fake slide-show “videos” (in air quotes) which are just the picture gallery set to music with some tired transitions. Many of my resort clips were guests simply doing a walk through to capture a feel for the resort for their friends or their own memories. Production quality not be much, but their utility and effectiveness to give people an authentic feel for the resort is invaluable.

Video is definitely taking over the web. A decent video of your resort is as much online table-stakes as an FAQ, map of the island and contact details.

I’ve now changed the videos in the Profiles to Sakis’ pieces for the resorts that he has done so far – Six Senses Laamu, Huvafenfushi, Dhonakulhi Island Hideaway and Lily Beach. Hopefully, more resorts will produce such vivid illustrations and hopefully, they will all use Sakis’ artistic talents to do so.

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Best of the Maldives: Historical Celebrations – Kurumba

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Kurumba heritage

The first resort to get a Snorkel Spotting was Kurumba which is just one of many firsts for this proud pioneer in Maldive resort history. It is the ‘Delaware’ of the Maldives resort union.
In a crowd of glitzy up-and-comers in the Maldivian resort scene, Kurumba stands out at the revered silverback of the pack. Already distinquished for extent of its experience and customer loyalty, they are hit their Ruby anniversary a fortnight ago. To celebrate, they are hosting with an unprecedented schedule of 40 ceblebrations through the year to mark their 40 years business which include such fun as…

  • Rescue Swimming Diploma competition for staff
  • Kurumba’s staff “Have For Talent” evening
  • National qualification commences for our Maldivian team
  • Opening of the Kurumba 40th year Museum
  • Inter-island Olympics (fusbal, volleyball, cricket and netball)
  • Maldivian Mothers cooking classes
  • Alternative languages classes round one completion
  • Lunch for employees with 20 years service
  • Kurumba History Coffee Table Book launch
  • Local Children Art Competition
  • Lagoon cleaning
  • Malé history tour
  • 40 Divers on Kurumba house reef
  • Family Day for staff with over 30 years service
  • Staff Anniversary Party
  • History presentation
  • 40th Anniversary Gala Evening

Congratulations and happy festivities!

Kurumba Heritage 2

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Best of Maldives Online – Twitter Tweets: LUX Maldives

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LUX Twitter

The top Tweeter of the Maldives resorts is LUX with 1,665. Unfortunately, it might be just a bit too much noise and I’ve turned off my LUX feed, but if you need a regular drip feed of Tweets from paradise, then LUX Maldives is one to follow (also Maldives.net.nv’s feed – which has secured the coveted ‘Maldives’ tag itself – is very active covering a broad range of bits from across the Maldives).

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Best of Maldives Online – Twitter Followers: Conrad Rangali

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Conrad Rangai twitter

 

 

 

While Facebook dominates the social media landscape, Twitter is much more emerging territory in the ocean of social media. Especially for Maldive resorts where only 10 resorts have active Twitter feeds. They have on average 590 followers and 665 tweets.

The classic standard of popularity for a Tweeter are their Followers. And for the Maldives the king here is 1,446 for ‘Four Seasons’. This account, however, covers both Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru and Four Seasons Kuda Huraa. So you could argue that it is really about 700 per resort. The Conrad Rangali has 1,364 Followrs (during my survey in January) just on its own so for now they would seem to be the un-asterisked crown.

#leadingtheway

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Best of Maldives Online – Facebook Input: Kuredu

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Kuredu Facebook

It’s all about the conversation.

That’s the conventional wisdom on social media. It’s all very well and good to put up your blog, Facebook page/group, and Twitter feed, but if no one engages, then you’ve sort of missed the point. The real acid test for successful social media is the ‘social’ bit. To what degree do people get involved with what you have to say? In blogs, it’s commenting and trackbacking. With Twitter, it’s Retweets and Replies. On Facebook, it’s wall posts and comments.

As such, when I was reviewing all of the Maldives resort Facebook pages, I decided to make note of the amount of non-resort comments and posts the page/group got. As I noted in my original post, the Maldives resorts average about one comment/post per day. But, the variation within that average is immense from some who get hardly anything to those like Kuredu who are a non-stop buzz.

Actually, for the period that I tallied (the month of January), Kuredu was the one resort where I simply had trouble counting all of the comments and posts, but I estimate that they we over 1,000! The next closest was Meeru with 213.

It wasn’t just the Wall activity either. As noted in yesterday’s post in Photos, Kuredu had held the runner up position for album contributions with 2,629 snaps. All of this online social activity is possibly an extension of their very strong ‘Forum’.

And not a single cat video nor motivational poster to be seen.

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Best of Maldives Online – Facebook Photos: Meeru

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Meeru Facebook Photos

A picture is worth a thousand words, and a good Facebook album can give you an insight out perspective of the resort.

After ‘Likes’, the next easiest measure to check out on a resort’s Facebook page is the number of Photos that Friends have posted. On this score, the Flickr of the Maldives is Meeru with 2,984 (as of the end of January). Today it is up to 3,030.

The next closest was Champa sister resort Kuredu with 2,629 (does Champa hand out cameras at reception or are they particularlt photogenic?).

Say cheese platter!

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Best of Maldives Online – Facebook Likes/Members: Kuramathi

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Kuramathi Facebook

Everyone wants to be Liked.

The most prominent bragging rights to any Facebook presence is ‘Likes’ (or ‘Members’ if you are set up as a ‘Group’). While this measure is debatable, it is transparent and certainly indicative of a degree of engagement and popularity.

The runaway winner for Maldives resorts is Kuramathi with 7,347 ‘Likes’.

Frankly, this is the page that kicked off my investigation into the use of Facebook by various resorts. When I went to the Kuramathi page I was struck by the richness of activity and contributions by both the resort and guests. I had visited plenty of resort Facebook pages, but Kuramathi’s made me wonder if any other resorts had stepped up to this level. I figured that I couldn’t dish out a ‘Best of Maldives’ without a more thorough examination. I really had to look at all of the resorts’ Facebook Pages (or in some case Groups). When I first made note of this idea for a post, Kuramathi had over 4,000 Likes, when I did my survey in January they had 7,347 and as of yesterday (see snap above) they stood at 7,786. In just a month, they have grown over 500 which is half the amount of the average total number of ‘Likes’ by resorts. In fact, their growth in a single month of 500 is more than total Likes/Members of 47 resorts.

I ‘Like’.

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Best of the Maldives: Craft Activities – Kurumba

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Kurumba crafts

Happy Centenary to the Girl Scouts.

Our family has a proud tradition in the scouts with my father an Eagle Scout and my grandfather a ‘Silver Beaver’ recipient. A good scouting career often starts with a range of creative activities and skils building. Often, with the spirit of scouting, many of the crafts and skills use materials and tools found in nature.

Kurumba’s new Majaa Kids’ Club and Majaa Recreation Centre would do the Scouts proud with their ‘coconut arts and crafts’. An extensive range of weaving, folding and other crafting of palm fronds are taught to kids of all ages including many equally enthralled mature students (see below).

Majaa Recreation Manager Monica Comanescu noted…

“The Dhivehi word, Majaa, means fun. This will be the underlying philosophy for the Recreation department. Majaa Recreation will be the ‘fun’ centre of the island. This allows it to be a unique identity and destination within Kurumba. The purpose of Majaa Recreation is to provide guests with many options to enjoy their holiday while experiencing the Maldivian palette and learning about the water that surround Kurumba in an environmentally responsible way with a Maldivian twist.”

Majaa Recreation offers more than just crafts with such a range of activities, Kurumba grouped them into categories…

  • Kan’du (Ocean) – Ocean based activities
  • Hakatha (Energy) Energy or sporting activities
  • Kulhivaru (Games) Games
  • Visnun (Learning) Understanding and learning activities
  • Haveeru (Evening) Evening activities.

Some people like to sit around and do absolutely as little as possible on a Maldivian holiday, but Kurumba provides an alternative for those who want the option for broader range of fun.

Kurumba Majaa

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Best of the Maldives: Breakfast Juice – Soneva Gili

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Soneva Gili breakfast juices

This is photo of Soneva Gili by Six Senses is courtesy of TripAdvisor.

If you prefer your revitalising fluids inside you rather than around you, then you might want to start you day off at Soneva Gili. I was first alerted to Soneva Gili’s exceptional juice array by Sakis in a Trip Advisor Forum post where he noted proposed Gili as one of the best breakfast buffets in the Maldives: “One of the best is Soneva Gili for breakfast buffet, the choice among 60 fresh juices makes it also unique.” Few people have seen more Maldive resorts than Sakis so it’s a pretty compelling endorsement to me.

Their juice menu is full of healthy and tasty concoctions like…

  • “Ocean Basic” – Apple and Carrots
  • “Morning Berry” – Raspberry, Apple, Orange, Spirulina
  • “Bloody Carrot” – Carrot, Beetroot, Celery, Lime).
  • “Green ‘n Pear It” – Broccoli, Celery, Pear (great name for anything with broccoli in it).

As you can see, their offerings include veggie juices as well as fruit. Each item on the menu also has a complete nutritional breakdown as well as notations on benefits to Energy, Detox, Immunity, Degestion and Skin.

Soneva Gili juices

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Best of the Maldives: Lagoon Breakfast – Mirihi

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Mirihi lagoon breakfast

If the lure of the Maldives is the pervasive surroundings of water, then after your morning bath or shower similarly encircled. If you want to have breakfast in the water rather than on the water, then you can enjoy your breakfast completely immersed at Mirihi. They offer a ‘Feet in the Water Breakfast’ for $68 per person which covers whatever the guest wants (not the ‘caviar’, but normal breakfast fare). Assistant Front Office Manager Bastian Singer describes…

“As you can see the table is directly set up at the shoreline and the guests really have the feet in the water during the breakfast. It’s mostly used for special occasions like birthdays or wedding anniversaries as there is as well a bottle of champagne included.”

We love the beach dining concept. From the beginning of our family’s trips to the Maldives, we loved to eat right out on the sand by the ocean’s edge. In the go old days, years ago, the resorts were pretty laid back and were happy to move a table out to the beach for you. Now, many of the resorts are even more happy and set up to do so, but they usually bill it as a special meal or service. I don’t begrudge the resorts for doing so. It is both a bit more of a kuffufle that would impede their operations if everyone did it every day. And it is definitely extra value. Now Mirihi takes beach dining a step forward from water’s edge to water itself.

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