Well, it may not be the type of activity I thought I would do in Bolivia, but I’d never seen a wrestling match, let alone a show wrestling match. It’s popular in the Americas, in the US and Mexico and, apparently, Bolivia. The special element in Bolivian wrestling is that it’s not the men showing up on stage as the protagonists, but the women. Aymara and Quechua women show up on stage in their beautiful wide skirts and two braids in their long hair, the traditional look, and put up a show where they control the narrative. It’s not just a spectacle, but a way to stand up for women and breaking traditional patterns. Something I had to see.
The show element and the drama are high. The ladies are announced and enter while hyping up the audience. We shout their names and clap along. There is a strong element of good and bad and we are invited to boo away the bad one. The fighting starts and it looks like the bad one will win. There are punches and swings and lots of hair pulling. Nobody fights fair and the fight leaves the ring. Fighters climb onto the ropes of the ring and fly through the air to land on their opponent. Good wins over evil and the next fighters are announced.
Some guys enter the scene, aiming to show those women how it’s done. Even the referee, dressed in a strange mask, gets involved and throws some punches. Layers of skirts fly through the air as the women get thrown across the ring to a booing audience. There is some improvisation necessary too. At one point a random tourist kid gets angry as the women get dragged around the room by the guys and punches one of the guys in the stomach. But of course the women team up and show the men what they’re worth.
The audience was mixed. There were some locals, but by far the majority at the show I went to were tourists, with matching fake Patagonia fleeces or llama sweaters. They even have special tourist tickets. It includes the transport to the venue in El Alto, some tickets to use the bathroom, a box of popcorn and a small souvenir. We were all sitting on plastic chairs around the ring. But at times the audience had to get out of the way for the wrestlers. At the very end, the show got really bizarre. There were two monsters on stage and they quickly left the ring. One was carrying a piece of meat and slinging it through the audience. They were rough and chairs were being messed up and shoved around. The audience dispersed and some were leaving the venue. Was this the way they signaled the ending of the show? I watched for a while and then decided to go find the right bus to take me back to la Paz. I’d seen enough madness.
