Bourbon Street and Pu-J's are the first to promote their Mardi Gras - a traditional New Orleans carnival.

Pu-J's held a rehearsal recently with its staff dressed in colourful costumes and wearing voodoo ritual beads and funny masks.

The stage of the popular nightspot inside the 88-storey Jin Mao Tower has also been decorated into a huge float in purple, green and gold, which represent justice, faith and power, respectively.

The high-energy new band Max Tempo from Los Angeles and dancers from Russia will create an unforgettable evening on Friday, March 3.

A wide range of Mardi Gras food such as crayfish salad will also be served to customers.

Bourbon Street on Hengshan Road, which claims to be the only authentic Mardi Gras bar and restaurant, will launch a slate of events for its March 3-7 Mardi Gras Weekend. They include a Mardi Gras party on March 4 with masks, beads and Mardi Gras martinis, Mardi Gras brunch on March 5 and feast on March 7, the Mardi Gras Day of this year.

Mardi Gras draws on traditions that are centuries old. Revellers go from house to house begging to obtain the ingredients for a communal meal. They wear costumes concealing their identity and which also parody the roles of those in authority.

They escape from ordinary life partly through the alcohol many consume in their festive quest, but even more through the roles they portray.

As they act out their parts in a wild, gaudy pageant, they are escaping from routine existence, freed from the restraints that confine them every other day in the year.

Mardi Gras Day is the last day of the Mardi Gras Carnival season. It falls on a different day each year, but always 46 days before Easter.

Pu-J's:

6:30pm-8:30pm, 200 yuan all-you-can-eat-and-drink

8:30pm, 150 yuan including one standard drink

Podium Level 3

Grand Hyatt Shanghai

2 Century Boulevard

Tel: 5047-1234

Bourbon Street Restaurant & Bar

Place: 191 Hengshan Road

Tel: 6445-7556