It was another regular Sunday evening on the Promenade Beach until the space in front of Le Café restaurant turned into a vortex of commotion.
As if on cue from some invisible conductor, a human circle formed, a peppy song began to play and a group of youngsters erupted into song and dance.
The flash mob brought to the beach by Jipmer to ring in their annual inter-collegiate festival ‘Spandan’ had pulled off a surprise among the crowd. And, as abruptly as the flash mob had launched into a performance the confounded looks on the faces of onlookers were replaced by broad smiles.
The gig by the 2012 MBBS batch was to trigger public interest in the upcoming marathon run to promote eye donation and also gear up for ‘Spandan 2015’ which is being staged across multiple venues in Jipmer from August 31 to September 5.
The Spandan poster was also unveiled in the joyous rumpus.
The ‘Endurance Marathon 3.0’ is being organised from Jipmer to the Beach on August 30.
The marathon will be conducted in three categories —school category, college category and open category.
The registration for the marathon is progressing at Le Café, Jipmer ground and Deepam channel office. The registrations close on August 27.
“The registration desks, including the one on the beach, have received good response. We expect to close with about 3,000 registrants,” said Ritvik Janardhanan, general secretary of the Jipmer Students’ Association, which hosts the Spandan festival.
Prizes worth over Rs. 1 lakh await winners of the marathon.
“We’ve had flash mob gigs on the campus but this is the first time we have used it as an outreach for a public cause,” he said.
For all its purported impromptu character, a flash mob is not as random as one may think.
It is, for all practical purposes, a rehearsed act.
And, to put first things first, the ‘mob’ part of the flash mob has to be taken care of; you need the numbers, dance skills are even secondary. “We spent over a week asking around for participants and finally enrolled about 60 students,” said Kavitha Girish, who along with college mate Aishna Arya curated the playlist and choreography.