The following is an excerpt from a recent interview with WWE Superstar Kofi Kingston from Kevin Eck’s Baltimore Sun blog:
Question: You got your degree in communications from Boston College, so how did you end up becoming a pro wrestler? And what was your family’s reaction when you decided to pursue a wrestling career?
Kofi Kingston: (Laughs) Initially my family just didn’t know how big the WWE was. I started training on the independent scene, and these are definitely not the most glamorous arenas. When I told my parents I wanted to be a WWE Superstar coming out of college, and actually having worked a legit job where I’m supposed to be climbing that corporate ladder and working towards retirement, to all of a sudden tell them that I wanted to kind of throw that all away and pursue a different career, they were definitely hesitant to support me on it, for sure. But I felt in my heart that WWE was where I wanted to be. Ever since I was a kid this was all I’ve wanted to do. I think your standard path is that you go through high school and college and you get your degree and then you really start working toward your retirement. You sit in that cubicle and that’s the path that a lot of people take, and that works for some people but it just didn’t work for me. So I just chose to follow my dream and I’m definitely glad that I did because there’s nothing like being a WWE Superstar.
Question: You mentioned starting in the independents and how it wasn’t glamorous. You were signed to a WWE developmental deal relatively quickly, though. You didn’t toil in the independent scene for years like some guys, correct?
Kofi Kingston: Yeah, I was only wrestling for about a year. We happened to have a tryout at our [wrestling] school up in Boston and all the WWE producers were there. It was just a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity where we actually got a legit tryout and they were there to see us, and I just happened to stand out to them. Luckily, they just liked what they saw. One thing led to another and before I knew it I was on my way down to Atlanta to Deep South [Wrestling] to train in developmental. It’s been a wild ride so far.
Check out the complete Kofi Kingston at KofiKingston.com.
