It is about 8 p.m. when the young boy steps out from the back of his father's Volkswagen. A group of four other children standing on the pavement watch as the street lights pick out the gold sequins on the boy's outfit. The boy pauses for a moment, his suit turning him into a glittering figure in the light, before he runs off to a nearby house.
Elsewhere, child-Kings, clowns and small children dressed as Rabbis run from house to house, singing, laughing and making lots of noise. Groups of men can be heard singing from inside houses and on the street and car after car pulls up, spilling out their children from inside.
At this time of year, Judaism puts on its carnival clothes to observe the festival of Purim - one of the most popular Jewish celebrations - giving Jews the licence to indulge in a large amount of eating and drinking for one day only.
The festival is based on the biblical Book of Esther and tells the story of a Jewish queen married to a Persian king. The queen intervenes to save her people from the murder planned by her husband's lieutenant, Haman. Purim takes its name from the lots cast by Haman to decide which day of the week to visit his destruction upon the Jewish people.
In two areas of north London, Golders Green and Stamford Hill, Orthodox and Liberal Jewish communities thrive and celebrate Purim with some style. In the often colourless days of this time of year, non-Jewish residents have come to enjoy stumbling upon boisterous festivals, which seem to come around every two weeks. And they have become accustomed to turning into familiar streets only to discover fairy lights threaded from tree to tree as another round of singing, with echoes of Polish and German verses, gets under way.
The festival of Purim, with its noise and colour, is no different and brings onto the streets of Golders Green and Stamford Hill Jewish and non-Jewish residents eager to take part and watch the spectacle.
"This tremendous noise and singing made me want to come out and see what it was all about," says one Stamford Hill resident as a group of children perform a short sketch in the street known as Purim-shpil or Purim play. "I think the Jewish people here have got it just right. It looks like tremendous fun."
A Jewish neighbour describes Monday night's visit to the local synagogue ahead of Purim parties on Tuesday, where passages from the Book of Esther are chanted. At certain points during the chanting, whenever Haman's name is mentioned, everyone in the synagogue is invited to bang drums, stamp their feet and generally make as much noise as they can to drown out Haman's name.
Food and drink is also an important part of the festival. Standing at the end of the front garden, we can see children passing around small pastries among their groups. These are known as hamantashen - Haman's ears - and the imagery, while not difficult to understand, seems a little gruesome. But perhaps no more so than that employed on Hallowe'en. The grown-ups, directed by the Talmud, are allowed to indulge in drinking so they will confuse the names of Haman and Esther's uncle, Mordechai, who helped save the Jewish people.
The festival of Purim has survived through centuries of change for the Jews. But according to Simon Rocker, Judaism Editor of Britain's Jewish Chronicle newspaper, writing in the Times this week, the left-wing Jewish Liberal movement tried to abolish the festival.
The Liberals wanted to "purify Judaism to a prophetic core", Rocker wrote, and were uncomfortable about the ending of Esther's story where the Jews rose up against their enemies "and smite them with slaughter and destruction". One Jewish Liberal writing before the second World War described the festival of Purim as "the most un-Jewish. It breathes a spirit of narrow nationalism and seeks to approve of revenge upon enemies."
Of course, the Liberal movement failed in its bid to end the Jewish tradition of celebrating Purim and they now join their Orthodox neighbours in the colour and revelry of the festival. And so now it is a chance for the entire Jewish community in London, Manchester and Newcastle to let their hair down and have a drink or two.
In the early morning in Stamford Hill, the streets are usually crammed with buses collecting children for school while mothers standing in their housecoats on the doorstep wave them off. Rabbis dash across the street to the synagogue and people go to work. But after the festival of Purim, the streets are unusually quiet. The music has gone and the curtains remain closed long into the morning. It was a good Purim.