Pedestrians have been randomly embracing each other after a resident chalked ‘hug here’ on a path outside his home.
Social media footage of passersby stopping to hug on the spot in a street in Surry Hills, Sydney has gone viral, attracting 1.2 million views so far.
The man who created the heartwarming street scene, Paul Grech, told Daily Mail Australia the video is one of two that have gone viral globally, attracting a slew of kind comments.
Everyone was just walking past with their heads down on their mobile phones, or with their coffee in their hands – and I just thought ‘I wonder if I can do something here,” he said.
‘Maybe people would do something silly, like snap out of their mobile phones … I did it as a social experiment really.’
His first idea saw him draw a hopscotch on the pavement, which prompted walkers -from elderly women to young kids – to hop on the traditional kids’ outdoor game.
One family stood in a line as they each took turns, and Mr Grech could even hear the stomping sounds in the dead of night. He had to wash it off as it kept him awake.
The footage of this went viral, and so he came up with the ‘hug here’ spot.
Within minutes of him chalking the words and setting up his video, two men stopped and hugged on the spot for a lengthy period of time.
One hugging moment that surprised the auctioneer was when a group of young men stopped to give each other hugs.
‘A lot of people are saying all around the world it is so nice to see guys, mates, stopping there and give themselves a hug,’ Mr Grech said.
One commenter to the post said, ‘my favorite thing is the dudes hugging it out’, while another said, ‘so nice to watch people just hug and show love to one another, especially the men’.
Other words to describe the interactions were ‘adorable’ and ‘wholesome’.
One joker wrote, ‘imagine someone from above drops water on that spot’.
In terms of any new ideas for the future, Mr Grech said ‘my mind is ticking, believe me… watch this space’.