A clown, a nurse and a police SWAT officer stroll down the street. A rocket ship follows them. This is not the setup for a joke, but a scene straight from Stamford Hill on Purim.
The Charedi answer to Notting Hill Carnival, Purim in this pocket of north-east London is an explosion of Yiddish songs, raucous dancing and toddlers dressed as fruit. The streets throb with honking cars, parade floats blast music, and children dart through the throngs in increasingly surreal costumes. Purim in full, unfiltered swing.
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One man in his 20s, Chaim, is dressed as a giant smiling emoji. What is his favourite thing about the festival, I ask? “Togetherness and unity,” he beams, swigging from a plastic cup of wine as he ambles through Clapton Common. He is, quite literally, dressed as pure happiness.
The costumes ranged from sweet to eccentric. Some families committed to themes – a loveliness of ladybirds, a colony of penguins, a band of pirates chased three tiny bears into a house. From lifeguards to pilots and horse riders to zookeepers, this is the Stamford Hill of dreams. A trio of little girls in Indian saris and a boy in a Mexican sombrero and poncho might make some liberally minded people wince with cries of cultural appropriation, but when a group of small children in tartan kilts marched past, their sheer cuteness can’t be denied.
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Oddly popular trends included barista outfits – from Starbucks to Costa – and a surge in postal workers. One group of sisters were dressed as immaculate cleaners, their red aprons neatly pressed, bright lipstick perfectly applied and gleaming dusters in hand.
Some boys – of whom I saw precisely none in cleaning costumes – were in military gear, wielding plastic machine guns and decked out in army camouflage. Others wore Israeli flags or vests emblazoned with their respective yeshivas’ logos.
And then there were the political statements. No one, it seemed, dressed as Sir Keir Starmer – or Benjamin Netanyahu, for that matter – but Donald Trump was everywhere. “Make America great again” (Maga) caps dotted the streets, including on the heads of Yanky Kahan’s two sons, who were dressed in inflatable red suits and a paper Trump mask.
“They like Trump,” Yanky said. But when I asked the boys what they liked about the US president, there was an awkward silence. They have never seen him speak because, generally speaking, Charedim won’t watch television. “I know he was shot,” one finally offered before they disappeared into the crowd.
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One teenage girl, fully committed to the look in a Maga T-shirt, cap and USA earrings, told me her brother was dressed as Trump too as a boy leapt onto a nearby party bus dressed as a pint-sized Donald in a black suit and red tie, his plastic wig slightly askew.
A TfL double-decker red bus and makeshift open-top floats took centre stage, alongside people-carrier cars decked out with balloons, blasting music. With traffic violations aplenty, there was a cheerful feeling of balagan. Boys danced wildly on open top decks and white vans wheeled past with the doors swung open and revellers leaning out the windows.
Local non-Jewish people stopped and stared asking: “Is it Halloween? Or Mardi Gras?” But others, of course, are used to the yearly carnival.
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Among exploding confetti cannons, for a few hours each year, Stamford Hill is a riot of colour, chaos and celebration – as security officers watch over every street corner, ready, as ever, to protect the community.
This year, the party wrapped up when Shabbat rolled in. As the last hamantaschen were gobbled up, the music faded and the costumes were packed away for another year; the frenzied ritual was over and Clapton Common faded back into its mass of black coats, beards and buggies.
