AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Mall walking is usually a way for some senior citizens to get their steps in. But in Portland, Oregon, a group of all ages is creating a different kind of mall walk. Strapping on retro spandex and sweat bands, it's part exercise, part performance art. Deena Prichep reports.
DEENA PRICHEP: Most of the storefronts at the Lloyd Center mall are vacant, part of the broad decline in mall shopping across the country. But the food court is happening. About 50 people are laughing and warming up.
KRISTA CATWOOD: All right. Let's stretch it out a little bit.
PRICHEP: Krista Catwood is a former burlesque performer in her 40s who started the Food Court 5000 just over a year ago. She loves costumes and started mall walking in full 1980s workout gear. Now that's the unofficial uniform. Today's group is a luminescent sea of neon leggings, fanny packs and scrunchies. Catwood tells the crowd how it's going to work.
CATWOOD: Rule No. 1 is you have to move your arms like this. It is the international sign that you are a mall walker.
PRICHEP: Rule No. 2 is that you have to wave to absolutely everybody you pass.
CATWOOD: Let me see you waving back there. That's right.
PRICHEP: She also tells walkers to listen to their bodies, whether that means quitting early or purchasing some hot pretzels. And then the final rule, nobody walks alone. Then the music starts, and they're off.
CATWOOD: All right. Let's go.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Whoo.
(CHEERING)
CATWOOD: Yeah.
PRICHEP: It is impossible to overstate what a good time everyone seems to be having. Mariah Erlick comes most every Sunday.
MARIAH ERLICK: It's such a fun way to just get exercise, do something really silly, builds community. And I just love a shenanigan (laughter).
STEVE VALLEY: One of the nice things is, in the wintertime, being able to come here and work out even when it's raining and cold.
PRICHEP: Steve Valley, who is wearing red, white and blue sweatbands, actually grew up going to this mall.
VALLEY: Hanging out with my high school friends, watching movies, putting quarters in machines.
PRICHEP: Now he's power walking past the claw machines and empty storefronts. And then the group finishes their first loop.
CATWOOD: It is now the time, my dearest darlings, to descend. When we descend in the Food Court 5000, do we take the stairs?
UNIDENTIFIED PEOPLE: No.
CATWOOD: When we descend at the Food Court...
PRICHEP: No. They take the escalator, and they own it like a catwalk.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MODERN LOVE")
DAVID BOWIE: (Singing) I catch the paper boy, but things don't really change.
PRICHEP: Walkers strike poses for the shoppers and security guards and for each other. Libby Rice has been coming since the beginning.
LIBBY RICE: I've met so many cool people that I have no idea how I would've met them otherwise.
PRICHEP: Today's group is all ages - millennials, people with canes, a 9-year-old doing cartwheels, support workers with their autistic clients, a married couple who actually had their first date at the mall's Barnes & Noble. Leslie Kelinson is 81 years old and leading the pack.
LESLIE KELINSON: You see how fun it is. I mean, this is therapeutic. It's medicinal. It's everything.
PRICHEP: It's also an actual workout. The Food Court 5000 does two full loops of each of the mall's three levels, for a total of 3 1/2 miles. And they end, of course, back at the food court, sharing snacks in something that feels like a church coffee hour. Leader Krista Catwood says they actually get compared to church quite a lot.
CATWOOD: 'Cause it's joyous. There's music. There's movement. It's a coming together. It happens on a Sunday. We are worshiping centering joy, I think, and right now, we could all use more of that.
PRICHEP: Though it won't be here. After more than 65 years, the Lloyd Center mall will close its doors in August. But the Food Court 5000 is scouting new locations, and they plan for the walk to go on.
For NPR News, I'm Deena Prichep in Portland, Oregon.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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