Thanks to the few who came out to the event. Like last year the turnout was dissapointing, but also like last year we made the best of what we had and pulled off quite a successful ride. We had some hiccups along the way with one of our cameramen missing the second train on the way down and then all of us missing the first train on the way back (you can blame that one on me guys). I never realised how little there is in Outer Harbour… we gave passersby some excitement with our pantsless shenanigans while waiting for the next train and we did things a bit differently on the way back.
[youtube:http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=k8JL_RE39Ko]
(also available on youtube)
Here are some reports from partici-no-pants:
Ben: From a partici-no-pant’s point of view, I have to be honest and say that I initially thought we were too light on numbers, but I was so very wrong. Even with the few people we had, it was a great experience with two separate no-pants-ing events in one day (plus the fun down at Outer Harbour).
I think the key thing to having small numbers is to approach the events differently. Improv Everywhere have the big numbers and can simply go for the shock value, with smaller numbers, you actually need to work on drawing the spectators into the story. This happened well on both trips.
The first trip, was purely about a bunch of people not wearing pants on the train. There was one, fairly vocal teenager who was freaking out a bit about my Indiana Jones boxers, and as soon as he started talking about it, other people started chatting too. Great for reactions. Even after we had all bought our pants back from the pants-collectors, he was still talking about it to people who were boarding the train after it had all happened.
The second trip was gold, and was a great example of how to draw other people in. We waited until the train was fairly full, and we all had our pants on. A couple of our support crew started at one end of the carriage and began asking people (both spectators and participants) to donate their pants for the homeless, under the guise of the charity ‘Pants for Peace’. The first group of people on the train reacted as you’d expect “What? You want me to take my pants off and donate them?” The girls did a great job at pleading with them. The group of people were still talking about it as they walked down the train.
I was the first one of the participants who was approached, and after a bit of chatter with the people sitting around me, I said, “hey, why not?” and down came the pants. We even got a cheer and a clap from the first group of people.
We had spaced ourselves fairly well through the train so as the girls made their way down, one or two people would stand and take their pants off, with everyone looking on at these brave people donating their pants for charity.
Great work, and the group size was definitely not an issue. We made do with what we had, and it worked out brilliantly.
Kara
: To be honest, I hadn’t planned to attend this event intially, but when I contacted Nick about support roles, there was one that needed filling; the ‘pants seller’. I had help of course, but basically the job description included collecting pants as the others took them off and selling them back later “at a bargain price.”
As Ben said, there were several pantsless activities on the day. The first I found a bit confusing, but ultimately worth the effort. We all boarded the train to Grange and the others got off at each consecutive stop before Woodville (where the pants sellers got off). Then when the train to Outer Harbor arrived 15 minutes later, each pantsless rider got on at their stop. It was so much more entertaining having the riders enter the train pantsless, especially when the other passengers are looking at the first one thinking “What the…” and then another and yet another pantsless person boards the train. We managed to pull off this plan without a problem except for losing one of the cameramen to the Grange line after he missed the Woodville stop. I unfortunately didn’t see too many of the reactions from the passengers, but I thought the whole ‘pants seller’ part worked extremely well. Nobody really expected us (pants sellers) to do anything because they were all distracted by the pantsless riders. We managed to create a huge scene with all the pantsless riders around us and I felt the responses by the flashmobbers were very good; it seemed like none of us knew one another. There was one passenger who made a huge scene about what happened; telling his friends and other passengers: “There were all these people on the train in their underwear…” “And then these ladies stand up and start selling pants…”. He was hilarious.
The second part of the trip was simple time wasting amusement. We stood along the side of the road at Outer Harbor, waiting for a car, motorbike, cyclist, anything really. Then as they went past, the pantsless mobbers waved their pants in the style of a Mexican wave. We got a few good reactions, some people beeped, others looked away and yet others gave confused looks. Unfortunately we didn’t know at the time that the road was a dead end and that we kept waving the same vehicles twice on both sides of the road. But usually the reactions were better the second time around. Some of the mobbers even chased a few of the cars that were driving REALLY slowly.
It was a problem that we missed the train back to the city from Outer Harbor in one sense, but we did have time to come up with the brilliant “Pants for Peace” plan (And by missed the train I mean that we stood there on the platform chatting as it pulled away from the station). As Ben said, the basic idea was that we asked passengers to donate their pants to charity. Of course, the idea is absurd, making it that much more entertaining when the mobbers gave us their pants. So we initially walked up to the front of the train, trying to seem as though we were serious about the pants for charity. None of the other mobbers were in that area, but we did get a few entertaining comments. One girl said sarcastically “I’d really prefer to keep my pants” and another guy made a huge deal about “You want my pants?” and “You want to take my pants off?”. Very amusing, but it set up for Ben who received a huge cheer and applause when he gave us his pants. I must say the mobbers were great in the way they asked us questions about it, hesitated and even offered money instead before finally giving us their pants. Some of the expressions on the faces of the passengers were hilarious, ranging from “No way I’m giving you my pants” to “I can’t believe that guy just gave them his pants.” There was one woman who gave us a little trouble. She asked us why we were still wearing pants. We answered as best we could with “we’ll throw in ours later” and “we work for the organisation” but I left her with “we’ll take that suggestion on board.” Overall, I think this plan worked much better than the other one for sheer shock/scene making quality. At the end, we sold the pants back to the mobbers after they had walked past the security at the Adelaide station.
So overall, great work despite small group size and well done to everyone on their acting skills!
Sambo : I must say, I had an absolute wonderful time with the guys doing this!
when getting on the train the first time without pants, i chickened out a little, and went to the front end… but doing so, gave those occu-pants a taste of me not wearing any pants… to my surprise a guy near me, looked, and just shook his head in disapproval. still good rather…
I really enjoyed the second ride; back to the city.
The traveler’s reactions were gold, and were really enjoyable to watch, while removing pants in front of them…
I loved walking through the train station in boxers… others taking photos as if, they’d never seen people in boxers before… lol
An enjoyable day, rated highly as one of my most memorable days…
Travis // TJ Says:
Hahah, a great day 🙂
Some favourite moments:
Part 1 – City to Outer Harbour, the shock factor.
James getting up and doing some stretches in the isle
The big dude opposite me desperately trying to ignore me
Climbing over all the people with bikes to get to the bin. Three times.
A 4WD full of people stopping while I was at the train stop and just staring, I was expecting them to drop off or pick someone up, but they just left after a minute or so.
The guy who attempted to explain what happened to everyone that got on the train after we had re-pantsed. He must have seemed drunk or something to the unsuspecting commuters.
Part 2 – Outer harbour shennanigans
The cars that drove veeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrryyyy sloooooooooooooooowly past the mexican wave, so we just chased them waving our arms, that sped them up 😛
The fact that half the people drove past us twice. That was entertaining.
Part 3 – Outer Harbour to City – Pants for Peace
My favorite part of the whole day. After having a stroke of genius during our wait at outer harbour (it was long enough to warrant one really), the charity Pants for Peace was born.
Kudos to the charity representatives, you did a sterling job. And the train carriage was perfectly laid out for maximum effect, a group of vocal kids at the start, generally pretty crowded, and the first to depants, Ben, facing the big open area near the doors, and those kids.
I loved the many comments and discussions from the loud kids at the start of the train. Things like ‘What are they going to do now? They have to walk around all day without pants’ ‘You want me to take off my PANTS?’ ‘Fuck that, My pants are too expensive’
Also entertaining was the lady opposite James and I, who refused to notice us. She had to try especially hard when James spread his legs and started scratching himself.
The general reactions to the pantless state of several train riders was quite entertaining, you’d get those who seemed thoroughly confused, those who seemed not to notice, those who tried really really hard not to notice, those who smirked and laughed, those who refused to acknowledge the situation, and those who felt they just had to say something about it to someone… perhaps just to check on their sanity.
I never realised how comfortable walking around in boxers is, I should do it more often.
Cheers to everyone involved, we made a very good day out of it.
Ashleigh : I got asked at the last minute to participate as a Pants Seller/Collector, and I admit, I hesitantly accepted. The whole idea of it was a little daunting at first, though once Kara and I had sorted ourselves out and got on the train, it was a smooth ride.
As my fellow participates have noted, the first ride to Outer Harbour got a great reaction. They did a fantastic job stripping on the train, keeping straight faces while wearing just underwear and shirts while other passangers stared in awe…
Once we arrived at Outer Harbour, as a group we failed to notice the train pulling away from the station 😛 So for the next 40 minutes we decided to entertain ourselves by performing a “Mexican Pants Wave” at the cars, cyclists and slow driving, stalker-like old people that came by (some of the boys even chased a few cars!). It was a great way for us as a group to have a good laugh and have fun.
When our next train arrived, we all sat scattered on the train. Kara and I walked down from one end to the other, asking the passengers if they would like to donate their pants to our charity “Pants for Peace – providing pants for the homeless”. Some were shocked (one lady in particular was not at all impressed at our lack of professionalism, and could not see why we were infact wearing pants ourselves), and others were entertained by us even suggesting such a thing.
Once we arrived back at Adelaide Station, there was again another sale – “PANTS FOR SALE! COME GET YOUR $1 PANTS HERE!!”
If you couldnt make it, you missed out on a great day!
Jennifer: First I have to say that I had less than no intention of coming along to this event, but a last minute request somewhat changed my mind.
I still had no plans to de-pant, but I was willing to come along.
I’m not going to do a play by play, it’s already been done and quite well.
While my participation level was basically non existent I did still have fun(despite how it may have looked to some ;-P)
Gotta say I’m miffed at myself and the lack of preparation time coz it seemed like it would have been awesome to run around in my undies, maybe next time huh!
