When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Christina “C-Bunny” Sarni had to reconsider her life as a professional wrestler while looking for something else to do for a living that brough her life joy, happiness, and purpose.
Sarni’s last bout was against Riley Shepard, an accomplished wrestler in her own right.
“She is amazing, and the best attitude in and out of the ring,” Sarni said of Shepard.
Despite being hearing impaired, Sarni had enjoyed a measure of success in the squared circle.
“I stopped around COVID times,” she recalled. “My last match is when I was booked as an extra, and we got a tryout match at WWE Raw in Madison Square Garden before they opened the doors.
“I miss the showmanship. I miss hearing my entrance music and coming out telling a story to the underdogs in the audience,” she added. “I believe every chapter and role in my life gives me the skills and experience I need for the next.”
But the pro wrestling business was not all a bed of roses, she noted.
“No one talks about how toxic the independent wrestling scene can be–abusive promotors, trainers, sexual harassment, low pay, bullshit politics,” were the few of the things that she mentioned.
Sure, those are some the pitfalls that most indie wrestlers experience. But Sarni also had to find a way around her hearing impairment–which, she said, was caused by nerve damage–in order to have success as a pro wrestler.
She said the deterioration has resulted in complete deafness on high pitch sounds and makes it difficult when she is having a conversation in a setting with background noises.
“With my life, remember, I had to go through the regular experience (wrestling) people had to go through, then the disability put obstacles on that,” Sarni, whose mother nick named C-Bunny as a child, lamented. “But I’m blessed that the documentary “Being C-Bunny” touched on my journey as a wrestler with a disability.”
So, the Brooklyn-born former grappler and dancer looked to her hobby of DJing that eventually turned into a full-time endeavor.
“I’ve been doing it (DJing) for three years,” Sarni said. “When COVID hit, it put a huge stop in my current jobs (at the time) because the mask mandate was implemented, and my only survival tool was reading lips.”
Just for fun at first, Sarni believed she had the chops to cut it behind the turn tables.
“I picked up being a bedroom DJ as a new hobby because I didn’t wrestle anymore,” she said. “And I took the leap to make DJing into a full-time career.”
Sarni credits pro wrestling and dancing as helping her transition into a popular DJ who gets regular work in New Jersey, New York City, and Philadelphia. She said it is a performance-based job, just like her other former gigs.
“You be surprised the skills I take from wrestling and my past dance career to help with my DJ career,” Sarni said. “Networking, showing face, and bringing your laptop (instead of your gear). Even while DJing, reading the room, picking the right song for the pop.”
However, one would think that a hearing impairment would present some challenges. But Sarni has devised ways to surmount the hinderances.
“So amazingly with technology DJ programs, as you can visually see the sound waves of each song and each color represents (a different) instrument,” Sarni explained. “I would get to know each song well and put in cue points to remember which part of the song is what. Also, I wear my headphones the whole time and I have a speaker next to me to hear and feel the beat on.”
While DJing and other professions Sarni did for a living took some adjusting to, Sarni borrowed a phrase from a popular movie franchise to explain her fight to be seen as a competent individual, as well as other hearing-impaired people.
“Just like every other career I had, people get surprised respectfully,” she said of people finding out she has some trouble hearing. “We can do skills where hearing is crucial. But just like that saying in Jurassic Park, ‘life finds a way,’ you figure it out and also, at some point, every DJ has a little hearing loss from the speakers, so I fit in sometimes.”
With the tri-state area full of DJs, Sarni said she works twice as hard to stay ahead of the game, not to mention the hearing difficulties she has to overcome in order to stay relevant.
“It is a very competitive industry with so many DJS in this area,” she said. “(Lack of) hearing will always be an obstacle, especially with networking because the environment is usually loud.”
As for a regular schedule and sleep, Sanir said, “DJ is not a nine-to-five job. You are on nightlife schedule: limited sleep, constantly trying to make content to get out there. In DJing, we can do a lot of double shows. I’ll DJ until two a.m. to having to be DJing at a camp at nine a.m., and back to another gig that night. You can forget about good sleeping.”
Sanir has a secret to help her stay awake: “Sugar-free Red Bull, and Diet Coke,” she quipped.
Now, Sarni has added a new wrinkle to her repertoire: producing, which has brought her immense pleasure, she noted.
“I started producing music, too,” she exclaimed! “That helps us too to get out there, and it’s amazing to see people dance to my concepts.”
A self-professed clubber as a youth, Sarni, whose favorite music to play is Eletronic Dance Music (EDM), uses that experience to help enhance her abilities at the ones and twos–an old-school reference to turntables.
“I used to be a huge club goer growing up, so I take what I enjoyed being on the dance floor into the dance booth,” Sarni recollected. “It’s not work. It’s a show for me.”
As for the progress she has made a pro DJ in a short period of time, Sarni relishes in every opportunity she receives to get paid to spin and grin.
“I couldn’t even turn on my DJ controller to now doing shows in NYC, Philly, and the Jersey Shore,” the Point Plesant, N.J., native said. “I was flown to Texas to DJ a wedding, too. Putting hard work behind something and it’s succeeding is amazing.”
And the beat goes on!
You can listen to Sarni’s DJing at this link.
— Jerry Del Priore
NY NJ Sports World/Brooklyn Sports World 