Adelaide

There is nothing more terrifying in this life than being chased by a fat, bloodied clown wielding a long knife and a hunk of what appears to be someone’s mangled, trainer-clad leg.

This was the reality of the Adelaide 2010 Zombie Walk.

With donations in aid of the local charity Foodbank SA, this annual Halloween event invites participants to gather at sunset in the city’s Rymill Park, dressed up in their Zombie best, to begin a mass exodus that takes them right through the heart of the city. The event’s simplicity is its brilliance, and is what draws a 3000-strong crowd from all walks of life to participate in its organised chaos.

With distorted faces leering at me from every shop window, ‘Be There or Be Scared’ invitations clogging up my inbox, and this year’s X Factor contestants looking even freakier than they normally do, I am as excited about this year’s Scary Season as I am about the Steps Reunion Tour. I’d far rather be in Adelaide, Australia, taking part in the only Halloween celebration I have ever really enjoyed.

A far cry from the ‘slutty vampires’ and ‘horny devils’ that will be tottering around London tomorrow, Adelaide’s Zombies were truly fearsome, impressively hideous creatures. My three friends and I felt rather nervous as we huddled together in the Park, our own backcombed, floury hair and bloodstained mouths paling in comparison to the gore-soaked pilots, bloodied Batmans and grisly nurses that mingled around us. I was particularly disturbed by the sights of wounded Zombie dogs, their ‘ribs’ gaping from their sides, and bloody Zombie babies, festering on their mothers’ shoulders.

As 7.30pm approached, our leader took to the stage, and the crowd let out an excited, bloodthirsty roar.

‘Louder!’

Rooooooar.

‘You can do better than that!’

Roooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaarrr.

‘Come on, who are ya...............MELBOURNE?!’

That really got them.

ROOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR.

 And with that, the walk was declared open, and ear-splitting groans resounded through the park as we raised our undead arms and began to amble unsteadily through the balmy October air into the city.

Visitors to Adelaide that evening would have been forgiven for abruptly U-turning and racing back to wherever they’d come from, as even to those of us in the know, it did feel a little like the world was ending. As the city’s traffic lights flashed incoherently, and the growing queues of cars were mobbed by groaning, grinning corpses, I half expected Will Smith to appear from nowhere and start dragging the rare and embarrassed looking civilians from amongst us to safety.

With the sun gradually spilling more blood over the rooftops, Grenfell Street merged into Curie Street and we stopped to admire the incredible artwork of a Shaun of the Dead style Zombie, who had an LP record jauntily sticking out of his head. He grinned at us in appreciation, and blood oozed out from between his teeth.

It was a truly bizarre yet empowering feeling to be marching disdainfully down the middle of the roads that I usually crossed with such caution. Similarly extraordinary was the sense of unity that we Zombies all seemed to feel. It was as if the curtain of social normality had been lifted, and suddenly it was perfectly acceptable for strangers to link arms with one another and pull faces at terrified ‘civilian’ children huddled inside their cars.

Within half an hour, the four of us were pushing past Bonnie and Clyde into the Colonel Light pub at our final destination of Light Square. In my opinion, the evening had been the perfect Halloween activity: brief, immensely entertaining and genuinely terrifying!

The popularity of Zombie Walks is increasing across the world each year, with Adelaide’s being one of the largest. Until there is one in London which can rival the Aussies in scale and scare-factor, you will not find me venturing out for Halloween. And I certainly will not be donning my ‘sexy witch’ stockings any time soon.