The moonwalk is a dance in which the performer appears to glide backwards while actually stepping backwards, using rapid movements of the toes and heels. Its roots go back well before Michael Jackson. A 1932 record links a similar step to Cab Calloway, Charlie Chaplin used comparable movements in his films, and early 20th-century Black minstrel routines had a move called Stepping on the Puppy's Tail that looked much the same. Ragtime composer Arthur Marshall described the effect as looking like being towed on ice skates. Jackson popularised the step by performing it on the Motown 25 television special in 1983, and it became his signature move.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.