Village Square was jammed full of people anxiously waiting to witness a marriage proposal at 4 p.m. on Saturday, March 22. Seasonal Whistler resident Jared Lekkas quietly arranged for more than 200 of his friends to be on hand to either help or witness as he proposed to his girlfriend at the climax of a flash mob event.
Everybody involved kept it secret from Sofie Obermuller, the object of Lekkas’ affections — his wife to be.
In 2010 the pair met at a hostel in Australia while both were travelling. Lekkas said before his flash mob event that after the first day they met they saw each other almost daily. He was clear there was something special between them.
“Proposing to Sophie has always been a matter of when — not if,” he said before the start of the flash mob. “We are in a secure relationship and we feel comfortable with each other.”
After four years of being together Lekkas and Obermuller knew they would be married but she just didn’t know when he would propose to her. With the date of the proposal chosen, Lekkas asked dancers from the Vibe Dance Centre to help and he shared the date, time and location of the weekend event with his friends and co-workers.
At 4:10 p.m. hundreds of people were ringed around the square impatiently waiting for the drama to begin.
With Obermuller finally in place and without notice to anyone, the sound of the Imagine Dragons song called On Top of the World started to fill the square. A few Vibe dancers began moving rhythmically in the centre of the square as the song volume increased. More dancers joined.
Eventually the centre of the square was filled with dancers. Lekkas emerged wearing a lion costume from the centre of the dance group.
Obermuller turned to a friend and pointed out her boyfriend was part of the flash mob, as she wondered why he didn’t include her in it.
He approached Obermuller and she quickly realized she was an integral part of it all.
“It’s a super surprise… it’s a great surprise,” she said after Lekkas slipped an engagement ring on her finger while down on one knee.
Check back with Pique on Thursday for more details of the Village Square flash mob proposal.
