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In big news for the corporate-bonding and wellness sector, it is believed that just one billion people around the world have taken a liking to one of Australia’s favourite past times of throwing different coloured dust at each other for fun.

Just under 15% of the planet’s population have began taking part in this ceremony, and for some reason it is really big with the international Hindu community – where it is known as ‘Holi’ – a word they came up with when they didn’t know it was called The Colour Run.

The Color Run, also known as “the happiest 5,000 meters on the planet” – is an event series and five kilometre ‘paint race’ that is owned and operated by The Color Run LLC, a for-profit company that came up with this cool idea of showering people in vibrant powders all by themselves without any influences from anywhere else in the world.

The untimed event has no winners or prizes, but runners are showered with coloured powder, made of food-grade corn starch, at stations along the run.

For some weird reason, the Colour Run has quickly become a Hindu spring festival celebrated all across India and Nepal and among Hindus in Bangladesh and Pakistan as well as in countries with large Indian subcontinent diaspora populations such as Suriname, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, South Africa, Malaysia, the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Mauritius, and Fiji.

For the Hindu community, the ceremony signifies the victory of good over evil, the arrival of spring, end of winter, and for many a festive day to meet others, play and laugh, forget and forgive, and repair broken relationships – something that the marketing team at The Colour Run LLC has worked hard to achieve.

In Australia, the event is popular with staff from random companies who’s bosses are having a mid-life crisis and trying to stay off the grog, and therefore looking for an alternative employee bonding sessions that don’t involve an open bar.