Every Sunday afternoon in the city of El Alto, hundreds of Bolivians and tourists queue at the door of the 12th October Sports Complex to watch women's wrestling. The fighting is performed by cholitas, indigenous women that wear pollera — multilayered, brightly-colored skirts — braided hair and bowler hats in the ring.
The women have endured a history of repression and isolation. “Our ancestors would say that women [in] pollera couldn’t even write or read, they didn’t even have the right to learn”, says Mary Llanos Sanz, 31, commonly know as Juanita La Cariñosa, the leader of the fighting cholitas. Slowly, however, the women are starting to earn respect in Bolivian society. Read more...
More about Bolivia, Us World, Us, Pics, and Work Play
No comments:
Post a Comment