Bengaluru’s hula hooping revolution: Dance, tricks, and flow take center stage

Social media has fueled the rise of hula hoop dancing, inspiring people to connect with their bodies and gain confidence through rhythmic moves.
Supriya Srivastav teaching a workshop
Supriya Srivastav teaching a workshop (Photo \ Express)
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BENGALURU: Brightly coloured hoops going round and round, staying afloat by the sheer rhythmic movements of someone’s waist is what most people think of when they hear ‘hula hooping’. But several hoopers across Bengaluru are pushing the boundaries of hooping by incorporating awe-inspiring tricks, dance moves and ‘flow movements’ at workshops across the city.

“Hula hooping spread like wildfire during the lockdown with people looking for a fun exercise to pick up. But the dance workshops followed much later – It’s not just in the waist, there are a lot of tricks that can be done ‘on body’ as well as ‘off body’,” says Nishitha KA, a flow artiste who hosts hula hoop dancing workshops.

She explains, “You can use any part of your body to spin the hoop, maybe your wrist, neck, palms, knees, the foot, or hand and choreograph to any song that you want to dance to – just get into the beat and grow with it!”

‘Hula hoop dancing’ or ‘hula hoop flow’ workshops, held by hoopers and flow artistes at dance studios across the city, witness people of all ages but mostly women in their teens and 20s. Aditi Bhat, a flow artiste and founder of Spinfinity, an organisation that teaches hula hooping to kids, notes, “I get kids as young as six but also women in their 40s, a couple of men also come, and they end up having a great time.

The number has definitely grown over the years as more people become aware of it and Bengaluru as a community, is very open to a lot of experiences.” Nishitha attributes this popularity to social media, “Social media has the biggest hand in it. It’s just so inspiring to watch people who are good at what they’re doing – you think ‘how are they doing it? It’s so graceful and elegant’, and then ‘I want to learn to move like that’,” she explains.

Participants at Hoop Jam Party
Participants at Hoop Jam Party

While the initial appeal might be visual, according to several instructors, participants end up forming a connection with their body, and gaining self-confidence. “I was this person that had a lot of stage fear and a lot of stiffness in my body – I feel that I was restricting myself,” says Priyanka, a hula hoop enthusiast who works in Ed Tech and occasionally performs at corporate events. She continues, “I never realised that you can have ease, grace, and enjoy yourself on stage. It’s given me a whole different identity and helped me build my confidence.”

Beyond attending hula hooping meet-ups and workshops which have been a popular event in Bengaluru since the pandemic, ‘Hoop Jam Party’, has become a fun event for hoopers to socialise and build community. Supriya Srivastav, the founder of Flowshaala who organises this, says, “Instead of a workshop, we thought of throwing a party. We had a ‘hoop cypher’ like a friendlier version of a hip-hop cypher with two people competing with their moves. The whole community could get involved and find space to do something or the other – with performances, and fun challenges like chugging a glass of beer while hooping or a challenge where they had to tie their hair while hooping.”

For beginners who want to try hula hoop dancing, Bhat recommends getting the right hoop for your height and starting with the basics. “Waist hooping is as simple as getting the right size hoop and most of your job is done. Even if you’re not able to waist hoop, you can still do a lot because the world of hula hoops has so many different aspects – you can start with one hoop, go onto two (double hooping or twin hooping) and then, three or four,” she says.

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