Special mention also goes to the guy who gave one of the ‘happy birthday’ recipients a paper hat. That was great! Also thanks to Nikki for grabbing some footage of the night.

If you were there, let us know what you thought the best parts of the night were! For those of you who weren’t there, check out the instructions below to see what we got up to!

INSTRUCTIONS

SOMETHING SMELLS
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LOCATION: Malls Balls
WHO TO LOOK OUT FOR: Other flashmobbers!

At 6:00pm sharp you should be hanging out around the Malls Balls – but something smells, and it smells BAD. Do one or more of the following:
- hold your nose
- check if you’ve stepped in something
- check if you put deodorant on
- ask the people around you if they can smell it too
- maybe even dry reach a bit
- blame the person next to you

HAPPY BIRTHDAY
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LOCATION: Malls Balls, front of Harris Scarfe’s, front of Myer Center
WHO TO LOOK OUT FOR: Bryn, the cupcake man
NUMBER OF TIMES: 3 (once at each location)

While you’re busy convincing everyone there’s a horrible smell around the place, keep an eye out for a GUY WITH A CUPCAKE WITH A CANDLE IN IT.

He will approach someone sitting by the Mall’s Balls and ask them to hold the cupcake while he ties his shoelace. Once he’s tied his shoe lace, he will walk away, leaving that person with the cupcake. As soon as he STRETCHES HIS ARMS WHILE HE WALKS AWAY, everyone will rush in with a ROARING chorus of Happy Birthday! (instead of the person’s name, we’ll just sing the words “Happy Birthday”). There will be three “hip hip”s and instead of doing a “hooray” on the last one, we’ll quickly disperse and head to the next location where you’ll wait for the cupcake man again. The three locations for this will be:
- Mall’s Balls
- Front of Harris Scarfe
- In front of the Myer Center (after this one, just disperse again, but hang around the Myer Center for the next one).

Also, if anyone wants to volunteer to be cupcake man (or woman!) then drop me a message.

FOLLOW THE LEADER
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LOCATION: Starting at front of Myer Center, end near the Malls Balls
WHO TO LOOK OUT FOR: Leticha and the large brown paper bag
NUMBER OF TIMES: 3

Keep an eye out for a person who will have a LARGE BROWN PAPER BAG with an Australian Geographic logo on it. This will be the leader for the next event. They will pick someone walking down Rundle Mall, and we’ll follow behind them. Whatever they do, we do. If they scratch their head, we scratch ours. It’s easiest if you just follow the person in front of you.

If they look behind them, we all STOP WHERE WE ARE and just look around like we’re minding our own business (it’ll be a bit of a laugh because we’re all in a line). Once they look behind, or we’ve followed them far enough, we’ll DISPERSE and thel follow someone else.

We’ll do this 3 times. Then head back to the Mall’s Balls for the final event.

MOBILE MAYHEM
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LOCATION: Malls Balls
WHO TO LOOK OUT FOR: Ben, with the shoe phone
NUMBER OF TIMES: 3

Mingle around the Mall’s Balls. You’ll need your mobile phone (or an alternative… see below).

Ben will spot someone who’s on their phone and stand next to them with his SHOE PHONE. We’ll start moving at a FAST WALK towards that person. We should eventually have a large group surrounding the person while talking (try not to get too close though!). Once we get close, start talking louder. After we’ve been standing close to them for a few seconds, we’ll all start saying goodbye, disperse and return to our original positions to do it again.

If you don’t want to use your mobile, feel free to use one of the following:
- a shoe
- a piece of fruit (I hear bananas make good phones)
- your thumb and little finger
- an old phone with a dial
- the Tardis

After we’ve done this a few times, we’ll disperse and head to the City Cross arcade for food.

INSTRUCTIONS

At 6:00pm: Stand around the shops by the Malls Balls with your hands on your heads as if you’re waiting for someone. Try and make eye contact with another mobber, wink and tap your nose, and then place your hands on your head again, then look for another mobber and do the same.

At 6:10pm: Take your hands off your head and SLOWLY CREEP towards the Malls Balls. Keep an eye on the other mobbers, and try and all get there around the same time. When you get close enough, reach out give the balls a hug. Once everyone’s there, give out a loud “awwwww!” for 10 seconds. Disperse in all directions. IMPORTANT: Don’t get too close to anyone sitting or standing there, just move around them.

At 6:15pm: Wander around the front of the Myer Centre. Start looking up. Pretend that you can see something, and start pointing. While looking up and pointing, slowly gather together and all point and look in the same direction saying “what is it?” etc. Try and engage other people as they walk by. How many people can you get looking?

At 6:18pm: Disperse and head to the entrance of Harris Scarfe’s

At 6:25pm: Drop a contact lens. If there are people walking past, just ask them politely to watch where they step, or even see if they can help you. If you wear glasses, find another mobber and help them look.

At 6:28pm: Find your lens! Rejoice! Give a cheer! Hug the people around you! Tell them story of the Great Lens Hunt!

Disperse and head towards City Cross Arcade, waving to the other people waving to you.

We will have a full event report and video up soon.  In the meantime we’d love to get your comments and feedback on how the event went.  Simply post them in the comments below.

We’d especially like to know:

1. Any funny reactions you saw or got from passers by, employees or other non-mobbers
2. Which mob activity you like the best and why
3. Any activity/s you didn’t like and/or ways they could’ve been improved
4. Any ideas for future flashmobs and events

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We did things a bit differently by giving out the instructions before the event while usually mobbers don’t get them until they show up on the day and receive a sheet of papper with the details. It seemed to work in getting more people out as this was our biggest flashmob event so far with around 50 people.

Check out the instructions for the event including details of each activity.  Watch the video below and read the comments from event participants.  Add your own comments.

Funny Video Moments

3:20- Guy in white jumper and blonde girl in pink top arrive after Chibo Cheers has finished and stand around waiting for something to happen…

3:55- Guy in black jumper with a coke walks by with a smile on his face

4:02- Two girls in red, apparently they weren’t part of the mob and just decided to join in.  At the end they said “why did we just do that?”

4:12- Tall, thin guy with light coloured clothing standing to the left of the girl with the camera, looking around interested

4:34- Girl in denim jacket and girl in brown jacket enter from the right and look on shocked.  They make another appearance at 4:55 (behind the pole) and are left standing confused once everyone disperses

Long time mobbers would recognise that 3/4 of the mobs we did were ones we’d done in the past so we had a good feeling that they would work.  The Line was no exception.  There’s something about a long line of people that just turns heads, and when you add that they guy at the front is holding a sign saying “please line up here” but with no explanation of why, people must stare while their minds search for an explanation.

Everyone seems to be in agreement that Chibo Cheers was the best activity and the most fun to participate in.  As expected, the cheering and clapping quickly brought a crowd of onlookers.  It’s hard to say whether they were more confused by the subject of our commotion or the speed of our arrival and departure.

Our last two activities were more subtle both visually and audibly.  Some people in their own little worlds just walked on by without even noticing, those more observant stopped, realising that something wasn’t quite right.  I think Boing Boing would’ve been better if we had people look in different directions and stand not so much in a circle formation. Murmer worked pretty well, might have perhaps been better if we’d spread out a bit more.

To end the event, those who wanted to headed into City Cross for some food and a chat.  In order to identify themselves as mobbers they were instructed to put their left hand on their head and walk around until they met up with others doing likewise.  This wasn’t captured on the video but it was pretty funny and certainly confused the security guard on duty.

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We love hearing about funny bystander reactions so if you can remember any or notice any good ones in the video, please put them in the comments.  Here’s some other questions we’d like to get your answers to.

1. Which of the four activities did you think worked the best?
2. Do you think the fact that we gave out the instructions before the event made it better or worse?
3. Do you have any ideas for future events?
4. Any other comments or suggestions?