Paris: Of the approximately 15,000 athletes who will flock Paris over the next month-and-a-half for the Olympics followed by the Paralympics, Bruna Alexandre will stay put in the Athletes’ Village for the longest time.

She has earned her overstay.

The Brazil table tennis player is competing in both the 2024 Olympics and Paralympics, joining a handful of athletes with that honour. The four-time Paralympic medallist is part of Brazil’s three-member women’s team – team events begin on August 5 – for the Olympics that kicked off on Saturday. She will then turn up to match or better her singles silver from Tokyo at the Paralympics concluding in September.

“Staying in Paris from July to September is a little bit too much!” Alexandre told HT. “But I have to look at the bright side. It was my dream since always, so now I need to enjoy it.”

A dream that was sowed not too long after she was born with thrombosis, which led to her right arm being amputated. A dream that took shape when she joined a table tennis club in Sao Paolo; and she had to persevere to “create my own space” training with able-bodied kids. A dream that wouldn’t abate even when she was stared at by other players while competing in this year’s World Team Championships where Brazil made the Round of 16.

That dream, now lived, has also placed the 29-year-old in select company of athletes to have competed in the same edition of the Olympics and Paralympics. It includes Italian para archer Paola Fantato and Poland’s Natalia Partyka, who became the first paddler to do so in 2008 Beijing and became an inspiration for Alexandre.

“It was like a movie in my mind,” Alexandre, speaking through a translator, said on how she felt about her Olympic selection. “I’ve been playing table tennis for 22 years, and this is the proudest moment for me. I cried in front of my whole country.”

She also gets emotional looking back at how far she’s come, and how her parents couldn’t stop weeping when they learnt about their newborn’s condition and the loss of arm. They were comfortingly told that she would, one day, make them proud. And here is their daughter making history as the first Brazilian to compete in both the Olympics and Paralympics.

Alexandre was seven when she began playing TT. A hyperactive kid growing up, her parents did not let the disability come in the way of her going outdoors and playing. “My parents didn’t see me all day and what I was doing,” Alexandre chuckled.

She was busy dabbling between playing futsal, table tennis and taking skateboard classes. She loved TT and kept at it because it is “a single sport, and I was good at tricking people”. Having growing up in the coastal city of Criciuma, Alexandre chose to move to Sao Paolo, Brazil’s most populous city, and join one of its biggest table tennis clubs.

“I had to create my space in the club, to train with their top players. It was very hard in the beginning because I would lose a lot against players of the club. But after a while I trained extra with the coaches on the weekends,” Alexandre said.

Playing multiple sports as a kid came in handy to build her lower body strength and balance. “Especially skateboarding,” she said. “It helped me get a better equilibrium and develop my body structure coordination.”

By age 11, Alexandre began representing the national para TT team. By 13, she also got into the youth national side and competed with able-bodied paddlers. She has since won their able-bodied national championships twice.

Technically, the biggest challenge going from para to able-bodied TT for her is the serve. “In the beginning, it was also balance. But after a while, playing with and having a routine with Olympic players helped a lot,” she said.

“In the Olympic sport, there are plenty of opponents. And it’s difficult to study each one. In the Paralympic event there are fewer players, so it’s easier to study them and prepare for them. Also, in Olympic TT, they are always on the ball.”

Alexandre mostly spars with other para paddlers in Brazil, but at times also links up “at the main centre where the Olympic team trains”. Along with Takahashi sisters Bruna and Giulia, she was part of the Brazil women’s team that won bronze at the 2023 Pan American Games. The team also made the Round of 16 (the same stage as India) at the Team Worlds in Busan, finishing behind Japan in their group. Alexandre won all her matches in that prestigious tournament except two against the higher-ranked Japanese and Korean.

“When I went to compete in Busan, everyone was staring at me,” she said, smiling. “But I won many matches. It gave me a lot of confidence.”

She brings that confidence into Paris, where she wants to repeat her performance of Busan in the team event for Brazil. And carry that experience in defending or bettering her Tokyo silver at the Paralympics.

“I know the Olympics is hard, but I have a goal to get a few wins. And playing here on the same table, same stadium, same lights, and against the Olympians, it will help me a lot at the Paralympics.”

Just her presence at the Olympics, though, will be a “big inspiration” for other para athletes, she believes. As it will to kids and people with physical disabilities who shy away from dreaming big and chasing it.

“Never give up on your dreams. Believe in yourself,” Alexandre said. “This shows that everything is possible – doesn’t matter if you have only one arm or one leg.”