LadySports ::: Angelina Pink Zacchara

MY MEXICAN ADVENTURE FROM A(ngelina) TO P(ink)!

By Angelina "Pink" Zacchara

I first arrived in Monterrey on American Independence Day, July 4, 2008, so from the beginning I had a heavy weight on my shoulders and a long road ahead. I was going to Mexico to work for the LLF for the very first time, and I knew I would be representing my country.

As is frequently done in Mexico, I was masked and given a new ring name…PINK. Not so much because of the singer, but rather because I had pink gear!

My first match, I was teamed up with Perla Negra against Tsunami and Chacala...all LLF veterans and really tough women. This match was just the start of my new career in Mexico.

The next week marked the arrival of another American, Dark Unicorn. But despite our shared nationality, she was anything but an ally. We had a WAR!

Everything was moving quite quickly, and in addition to all of the traveling and training and the matches themselves, I was busy just trying to remember the Spanish that I had learned in school. Some days I would arrive in Monterrey a day early and leave a few days later, so that I could train and just pick up any Spanish that I could.

Soon, there came the arrival of yet another American…and not just any American: Christie Ricci was back in Monterrey! For the next few weeks, I had the opportunity to learn so much from her. Christie had spent a great deal of time in the LLF several years earlier, and she was still a huge star down there. I was lucky to have her showing me the ropes and teaching me new things.

During those crazy weeks I was given a new mask, one that I got to design on my own…and somehow I had half of my hair chopped off and dyed pink!

Things can definitely get wild in the LLF ring. I was in a tournament match against the always rough Chacala, which I lost; I had to face her again the following week in a Three Way Match that was even rougher…and at the end of the match, I had somehow split open my elbow. It was pretty bad, but I've had cuts before. It just comes with the territory. The fans really loved it, though!

But my matches weren't the only ones that were memorable to me. That same night, Christie wrestled Princesa Sugey in an amazing Four Falls Match! *WOW* was all I could say when that one was over!

So, the following week I was stunned to read that my opponent would be ‘La Destuctadora de las Extranajeras'...Princesa Sugey! Oh my goodness, was all I could think. Sugey is one of the top…if not THE top…wrestler in all of Mexico, and she is the "Foreigner Killer". That is what she is known for, and people around here still talk about that bloodbath match she had with the Dark Angel, Sara Stock, in which Sugey beat Stock, claimed her mask and chased her out of Mexico! I definitely had my work cut out for me.

I trained all week back home in Texas with the few good Lucha wrestlers here, and I trained down there for a full five hours in the morning of my match. By the end of the night I was exhausted and battered. It was a hard-fought battle, and I was ready to go home and sleep HARD! I had a pain in my elbow still, since it was injured from the week before. The pain only continued to get worse after I arrived home. I went to the doctor with a fever, and was told it was a Staph infection!

I missed about a month of wrestling, due to complications. I'm just lucky it wasn't any worst than it was.

I returned to Mexico in September, and had different matches every other week. On Halloween night I wrestled Dama de Hierro, and each week onward we were trying to out-do each other in our matches. It was not until November that she had taken my mask off me in a match, which enraged me. You've got to understand, in Mexico, you do NOT take another woman's mask!

Our feud had made us so popular with the fans, we were both booked to take part in the LLF's huge Anniversary Show on December the 5th, in a 6 Woman Match.

Actually, only 5 of the 6 women announced for the match appeared that night: myself, Angelica, Tsunami, Chacala, and Dama. The match was elimination style, where if you pin or submit someone, then you were safe and out of the match. The last woman in the ring would either lose their mask or their hair, if they did not have a mask. That whole night was a whirlwind, there were so many people there and so many cameras flashing! The last two in the ring were me and Chacala. How fitting! We went back and forth with exchanges and she finally stopped me when I went for a flying headscissors and instead she gave me a Sidewalk Slam, which was followed by her finisher, the "Bombazzo" sit down power bomb. I was done. I was going to have to go through the humiliation of losing my mask. In Mexico, it is a dishonor to be beaten and made to surrender your mask.

While it was humiliating for me, it was glorious for Chacala. She wielded my mask like a trophy, holding it up for all of the fans to see, while I sat with my head in my hands.

There were so many cameras and people asking me questions that none of it had sunk in. It really did not sink in ‘til the next week...the second half of the anniversary show.

I was asked to return, only with a little help.

There would be a tag team match. Chacala brought La Tigresa, and I was asked to pair up with Simply Luscious, the best female wrestler in Texas (in my opinion) and another huge ‘Yanqui' star in Mexico. There would be a huge change for me though: I couldn't wear a mask any longer, having lost mine, and since I was unmasked, it didn't make sense to keep calling me Pink. So, for the first time in the LLF, I got to wrestle under my regular ring name…Angelina.

Simply Luscious and I had everything under control, and I was thrilled with the idea that I would get my revenge on Chacala. As they say, victory was ours…until Polly Star interfered in the match, that is, and it became a 3-on-2 battle.

Now, one of the facts of life in the LLF that many American fans might find strange is that the referees have a lot of discretion as to what sort of rulebreaking they'll allow. Some refs are even well-known as ‘heel refs' themselves! This is all completely accepted in Mexico, so no one got very upset when our ref decided to let Polly Star jump into the ring and take part in the match…no one except Simply Luscious and me, that is! What had started out as a battle had now evolved into a war…and unfortunately, my partner and I were out-gunned. We fought with everything we had, but the odds were against us, and we were defeated.

It was a hard end to accept…we had come so close, and it felt like the victory was stolen from us. With the 2008 LLF season over, it was time for me to go home, and I was good and ready for it. My body was beyond tired.

I have had the holidays to reflect on everything, the good times and the bad, the wins and the loses, and I am happy with the experience that I gained down there. I've met so many different people and learned so many things. I am a lot smarter as a wrestler now, and those luchadoras are not going to have an easy time with me in 2009!

I started in Texas as Angelina, and I went to Mexico and became Pink. I am strong. I never gave up. Pink took the best and worst that Mexico had to offer, was beaten down and bloodied, but still came back for more every time.

Call me Angelina…call me Pink...I may have lost my mask, but I have not lost my dignity, nor my will to survive and my desire to keep fighting!

(The 2009 LLF season begins in March. Watch for details here and at Luchadoras.net! And you can visit Angelina online at myspace.com/angelinabrutality, while Pink may be found at myspace.com/llf_pink)