Twin sisters and UA alumnae, Paulina and Fernanda Bueno, are off to Rio de Janeiro to volunteer with the L.I.V.E. Olympic Project.
The Bueno sisters, who graduated in May and will begin graduate studies in the fall, left early Tuesday morning to participate in community service abroad for two weeks.
After seeing the volunteer opportunity on a Spanish and Portuguese department listserv in September, Paulina said they decided to apply because it’s something they’ve never done before.
The Buenos, who were born in Mexico but moved to Tucson when they were 10 years old, said although they were really involved on campus, they never got the chance to study abroad.
“We’ve always done some sort of community service in Tucson,” Fernanda Bueno said. “So being able to take it a step further and bring our love for community service abroad was something we really wanted to do.”
Fernanda and Paulina Bueno are part of a group of 10 UA students traveling to Rio during the Olympic games who will volunteer alongside students from other universities around the country.
“We’ll be there for two weeks and the first couple of days we’ll be delivering medical supplies to the low-income neighborhoods in Rio,” Fernanda said. “We’re also going to build gardens and plant vegetables and fruit so they have fresh food available to them.”
Paulina said they will also be teaching the kids basic English skills and taking them to a few Olympic games.
Fernanda said, for many of them it will be their first time going to an event like that because they just don’t have the income to go and buy a ticket.
“The kids don’t really have much over there so they’ll appreciate what we’re giving them whatever it’s materialistic, knowledge or our time,” Paulina said.
ernanda Bueno said they know Rio isn’t the safest place, but she’s looking forward to seeing how kids live their everyday lives and what makes them happy with what they have, because they can’t just move.
“I hope to really just gain experience, knowledge and perspective to take back,” Fernanda said.
oth Buenos said they are happy to be sharing the experience with one another and hope it will be the first of many adventures.
We found out back in December we were accepted, well I got my email first and [my sister] got hers later, so that was a plot twist,” Paulina said. “But if she wouldn’t have gotten in, I wouldn’t be going.”
Both Buenos said they wouldn’t of gone without each other because it wouldn’t be the same.
“It’s our first time going abroad so going by ourselves would have been weird, we’ve always been together,” Fernanda said. “That’s why when we found out we were both accepted we decided right then we were going and weren’t going to waste the opportunity.”
Paulina said it’s fun to have another person to talk to and if you get lost then at least you’re lost together.
“Explaining something is very different then having experienced it yourself,” Fernanda said. “So when we come back we’ll have shared this great experience which we can talk about for months or even years.”
Follow Chastity Laskey on Twitter.
