01/09/2019 – Cholitas wrestling, La Paz, Bolivia

Josh went down and had breakfast in the hostel whilst I stayed in bed. We chilled in the room for the morning then dropped our laundry in downstairs on our way out. We walked into our local area of Sopocachi and ended up in Alexander Coffee for lunch again because most other places were closed – it is a Sunday after all! We took a slow stroll back through the town and popped into the hostel to grab our things before heading out to get the teleferico (apparently the largest cable car system in the world!) We navigated our way to the centre of La Paz. When we got out of the teleferico station we found ourselves walking through the dregs of a large market. All the roads of the city had been shut all day, and we were told it was a sort of bank holiday here today. There were bouncy castles in the road and there were loads of cyclists and skateboarders making the most of the open roads, usually stacked with traffic. There were queues of cyclists at the bottom of the mountain waiting for the teleferico back up, so they could cruise back down again. It looked really fun! We walked to the Wild Rover Hostel where we had been told to wait for a bus to pick us up for our excursion. The bus turned up about half an hour late, in true Latino time, and a load of tourists (including us) boarded. We got driven to the area called ‘El Alto’ and to an empty sports hall. We got handed our vouchers and went inside. There was a wrestling ring set up in the middle of the hall, a few rows of plastic chairs around it, and tiered concrete steps along one edge of the hall. It wasn’t long before there was an atmosphere, an even mix of tourists and locals ready for their Sunday evening entertainment. Part of or voucher entitled us to a souvenir – we got a keyring of a Cholitas wrestler. A Cholitas wrestler is an indigenous Bolivian lady that wrestles. It was explained to us that this came about because about 20 years ago there was a lot of racism against the indigenous communities in La Paz. Cholitas used to be used as a derogatory term. The female indigenous community started wrestling to demonstrate their strength and power, and now apparently are some of the richest people in La Paz, and are no longer discriminated against. It has become a huge source of entertainment for tourists and locals alike. We also got a snack with our voucher, and were handed a glass bottle of coca cola and a bag of popcorn each. Josh and I sat few rows up on the concrete steps (it was bloomin’ freezing!), and tucked into our snacks as the show began.

It was very comical and the crowd was well up for it! The opening wrestle was between two men, and then the main show started. The Cholitas ladies danced their way through the crowd, swirling their brightly coloured layers of frilly skirts, wearing little dolly shoes, and two long plaits – used mainly to strangle each other with! The show was a blast, the crowd got very involved! Beer cans were smashed against wrestlers heads, water and coca cola was spat everywhere, popcorn thrown, it was very entertaining and the wrestlers looked like they were having a very good time too. It was quite surreal though, a stark contrast to the shy Bolivian women we are used to coming across! At the end we got our pictures with the wrestlers and then we were rounded up and herded back onto the bus. We got driven to a hostel called Selina in Sopocachi where we shared a little pizza before getting a taxi back to our hostel around the corner and heading to bed.