New Smyrna Beach tennis player Mariana Divardin has followed in her mother´s footsteps - coming from Brazil to go to school and play tennis, while staying with the same host family.

From Brazil to America

By MICHAEL LEWIS
Staff Writer

NEW SMYRNA BEACH — The bond began with a rather unassuming request, 21 years ago.

New Smyrna Beach tennis player Mariana Divardin recently stopped to visit her previous host family - Joanne Roberts, at left, and Don Roberts - at their home in New Smyrna Beach. Mariana´s mother, Gisele, also stayed with the couple in 1985. (Photo: News-Journal/Ji-Eun Lee) Barracudas junior Mariana Divardin hits a backhand during a recent practice in New Smyrna Beach. (Photo: News-Journal/Roger Simms)

At age 22, Gisele Werneck (now Divardin) had come over to the United States from Brazil as a foreign exchange student.

She ended up in New Smyrna Beach, and enjoyed her two-month stay.

But as her other exchange student friends went back to South America, Divardin sought out Don and Joanne Roberts, a local couple who also were involved in the program.

“She just came up to us and said, ‘I want to stay longer, can I come live with you?’” Joanne Roberts recalled recently. “We knew she was a good kid, so we said sure.”

That one decision led to the beginning of a wonderful, cross-continental friendship. Gisele eventually returned to Brazil, married and had a family, remaining in periodic touch with the Robertses.

That friendship has proved to be a major boon to the New Smyrna Beach High School girls tennis team. Last June, Gisele´s daughter, 16-year-old Mariana, arrived in town and moved in with Don and Joanne.

Mariana is a rising star in tennis, and before she left Brazil she was ranked in the top-30 in the country in her age group. This spring she has won four of her first five singles matches (through Monday) at No. 1 singles for the Barracudas, and is a strong candidate to win Five Star and district championships in two weeks.

“It´s been so great to be here with them,” Divardin said, pointing to Don and Joanne. “My whole family felt so much better knowing I was coming to stay with them.

“It´s made the whole thing so much easier.”

A BRAZILIAN CONNECTION

Mariana Divardin could be her mother´s twin. Looking at old pictures of Gisele when she stayed with Don and Joanne, you see the same eyes, the same bone structure and the same sweet smile.

“Sometimes Don even calls Mariana ´Gisele´ when he´s talking to her,” Joanne said with a chuckle.

After Gisele returned to Brazil she married Cesar Divardin, became a high school English teacher and settled in Ponta Grossa, a city of about 300,000.

A few years after returning, Gisele received a strange phone call from her sister. Apparently a couple from Florida were vacationing in Brazil and were trying to track her down.

Something about being old friends of hers.

“We only knew her maiden name, but we got lucky and found her sister and we got back in touch,” Joanne said.

From that good fortune, a relationship was re-established.

When Mariana was little she loved swimming, but when she was 7, Cesar enrolled her in a tennis program.

While she said she “was terrible” at first, Mariana quickly grew fond of the sport.

“I love it because you have to make your own decisions all the time,” she said, her English only slightly accented. “You have to use your head, and it´s all up to you.”

The Divardins visited Florida to see the Robertses when Mariana was 10, and immediately the young girl was smitten.

“I´ve just always wanted to travel and see places, especially America,” Mariana said. “And the Robertses kept saying, ‘Oh, you have to come stay with us one day.’”

A TOUGH TRANSITION

As she continued to excel in tennis in Ponta Grossa, Mariana kept nagging her parents to let her come to the U.S.

Finally, before her third and final year of high school in Brazil, Cesar agreed, and asked the Robertses to help find a way to make Mariana´s dream happen.

“It´s not as easy as just taking a kid over here and enrolling her at school,” Don said. “It took a lot of phone calls and finding a sponsor.”

Mariana was finally accepted as part of Rotary International´s Youth Exchange program, and armed with her rackets and her luggage, showed up in New Smyrna Beach in June.

She also was transporting quite a bit of fear in her bags.

“The whole last few months I was all excited about leaving (Brazil), but then the last few days I was really freaking out,” she said, laughing. “I wanted a change and to explore and all that, but then at the end I was like, ‘Do I really want to leave all my friends?’”

Like any new kid at school, Mariana was a curiosity at first; sadly, the New Smyrna students were woefully ignorant of her homeland.

“They would ask if Brazil was in Africa, and if we had elephants running around all the time where I´m from,” she said.

“And it was hard to make friends, because people would come up (and) say, ‘So you´re the new girl from Brazil,’ and that was it.”

With tennis season still months away, the Robertses, who estimated they´ve hosted about a dozen students over the years, became Mariana´s best pals.

“We never had to worry about her staying out late (at first), because she didn´t have anyone to go out with,” Don joked.

Once she made it onto the tennis courts, Divardin felt much more at home. She´s a powerful baseliner, with broad shoulders that help her pound away on her forehand. She also possesses a smooth stroke that allows her to befuddle opponents with a deep, slicing backhand.

Mariana was in a tight battle with the area´s reigning female tennis gold standard, Spruce Creek´s Ashley Pilsbury, recently, before Mariana injured her ankle and lost, 8-3.

Mariana quickly gained acceptance with her teammates as well; despite vaulting immediately to the No. 1 singles spot, a situation that might have been received with hostility by New Smyrna´s squad, she was voted a captain by her fellow players.

“She´s really been wonderful to have on the team,” New Smyrna coach Sandi Kinsey said. “She´s a terrific player and has fit in so well with the other girls.”

Six months after Mariana was settling in with the Robertses, she moved in with another local family, Barbara and Les Ogram.

The exchange program mandates that the student live with multiple families, the Robertses explained, so the kid can get a range of experiences.

Still, watching Mariana interact with Don and Joanne, it´s easy to see Gisele´s daughter keeping a relationship with the couple long after she´s returned to South America.

“They´ve been really, really good to me,” Mariana said with a smile. “It´s been so great having them here to help me.”

Oh, and one more thing.

“I´ve told them I´ve got an 11-year-old brother who wants to come over one day, too.”

DID YOU KNOW

Born in 1939, Brazilian Maria Bueno began playing tennis at a young age and won her first tournament at age 12.

Joining the international circuit in 1958, Bueno won the Italian Open and the women´s doubles at Wimbledon with Althea Gibson. The following year, she won her first singles title at Wimbledon.

Bueno was ranked No. 1 in the world in 1959, 1960, 1964 and 1966, and was a member of the top-10 10 times between 1958 and 1968.

Bueno was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1978.

— Compiled by News-Researcher Barbara Buttleman