While La Paz sits in a valley, its urban sprawl continues at high altitude. El Alto is the sprawliest part of greater La Paz, sitting on the edge of Altiplano plateau. El Alto is expanding in the way cities in developing nations do, rural people moving to the city. Consequently it has a very high proportion of indigenous Bolivians.
The indigenous Bolivians women are famous for their bowler hats, big skirts and colourful clothes. In the past they have been subject to some scorn by other Bolivians and the term "Chollita" was used as a derogatory term for them. Often poor and living in impoverished areas they often took the brunt of the hard end of Bolivian life.
Enter wrestling! Chollita wrestling is part of the Latin American "luchadore" style of comic/theatrical professional wrestling. The unique difference is that the overweight masked men play second fiddle to the Chollita - women dressed in traditional Andean garb, with pigtails and big personalities.
Popular with El Alto locals and tourists, each Sunday there are flights/performances. We were taken by bus up to El Alto to a community sports Hall. Just prior to getting on the bus we bumped into the manager of the restaurant we had eaten at the night before. He arranged with the lady taking us to include Celia in one of the bouts.
We were given front row seats as we arrived. Two male wrestlers were already fighting in a battle of good v evil with the referee taking the side of evil. The choreographed battle continued with the bad guy victorious.
The other fights continued in the same way with different combinations of fighters (luchadores or Chollita or both) and dodgy referees throwing each other and faking kicks and punches. The crowd got rowdier throwing pop corn at the bad guys - who in turn threw things back including beer cans.
The star of the show's bout then came on, a big last with cold teeth and a huge smile. She was to fight a guy dressed sort of live Elvis with Damien 666 on his shirt. Naturally she could easily defeat him but the referee was taking his side. So she enlisted the aid of a young male tourist and with the odds evened the referee promised to be more impartial. The tourist left the stage...
But soon the battle became once again one Chollita versus two men! Together the men managed to trap the star in a sack and as the ref went off to find something to hit the sack with, things looked grim for everybody's favorite wrestler.
At which point Celia stood up wearing a wrestler's mask and pointing an accusing finger at the lone make wrestler. She then rescued then star from the bag and together defeated the bad guy, forcing him into the sack. Quickly they then hid under the ring before the referee returned.
The referee came back and promptly began hitting the sack (in which he supposed was the Chollita but which actually held Damien666). Eventually the trick was revealed and Celia and her wrestling partner returned to the ring to finish off the two baddies. Good triumphed and to applause Celia returned to her seat.
More bouts followed, but the last bout departed from the normal sequence of good-wrestler v bad-wrestler + corrupt referee with the sound of ominous organ music. A shambling bear like monster appeared. The monster defeated the bad Chollita, the cross-dressing referee and began to menace the heroine. At this point a man dressed as a skeleton came to help the good Chollita. However neither could defeat the monster but both were quick enough to escape it's clutches. Frustrated the monster rampaged into the crowd, scattering spectators and frightening small children. Finally the monster picked up a stagehand and departed...and the show was over.
A truly amazing evening!
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