Zozobra

Zozobra
Zozobra burning in 2005
Begins	Around the end of August and start of September
Frequency	Yearly
Venue	Fort Marcy (New Mexico)
Location(s)	Santa Fe, New Mexico
Inaugurated	1924
Founder	Will Shuster
Organised by	Kiwanis

Zozobra (also known as Old Man Gloom and sometimes branded as Will Shuster's Zozobra) is a giant marionette effigy constructed of wood, wire and cotton cloth that is built and burned on the Friday of Labor Day weekend prior to the annual Fiestas de Santa Fe in Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States. It stands 50 ft 6 in (15.39 m) high.

The name is taken from the Spanish word zozobra referring to a strong feeling of anxiety or worries, and as its name suggests, the effigy embodies gloom and anxiety; by burning it, people destroy the worries and troubles of the previous year in the flames.^[1] Anyone with an excess of gloom is encouraged to write down the nature of their gloom on a slip of paper and leave it in the "gloom box" found in City of Santa Fe Visitors' Centers in the weeks leading up to the burn. Participants are also welcome to add their glooms at the annual ZozoFest, a festive precursor event that takes place the weekend before Zozobra burns. Those who attend the burning can also add documents at the venue on the day of the burning, up until 8 pm MT, at a "gloom tent," where they can add their woes to the marionette's stuffing. Legal papers, divorce documents, mortgage pay-offs, parking tickets, a Martin guitar and even a wedding dress –– have all found their way into Zozobra to go up in smoke.^{[citation needed]} At the festival, glooms from the gloom box are placed inside Zozobra to be burned alongside it.