Rudy Perecin Mareno always knew he wanted to go back to Brazil.

A 2005 graduate, he grew up in Sao Paulo before moving to the U.S. for six years to go to college and work. This summer he sold all of his belongings with the goal of settling in Brazil’s poorest state and starting a foundation to spur development.

But before the 23-year-old opens up shop permanently in Sao Luis do Maranhao in Northeastern Brazil, he is spending more than 100 days crossing through Central and Latin America, making contacts and talking to the people. Mareno wants to find out what their lives are like, what their needs are and what the overall conditions are in the region, so his foundation can do its best to help Latin Americans.

Mareno left a job at a Cuban lobbying organization in D.C. in August to embark on his journey. He started heading south from Washington, passing through the gulf coast of the U.S., and is currently in Mexico, going from city to city. Upcoming stops include cities near the Yucatan Peninsula, Central American volcanoes, the Colombian jungle, Amazonian rivers and Indian territory before Brazil, which he hopes to reach before the end of the year.

“I think I have a duty for my country,” he said. “On my way back, I am crossing through all of Latin America to find out the reality of how they live.”

Mareno said he feels obliged to take the skills he learned in the U.S. and at GW, and apply them to where they are needed in his home country. He decided on Maranhao, even though he has never visited that area, to set up his non-profit because it ranks among the lowest of the Brazilian states in literacy rate, electricity distribution, Gross Domestic Product per capita, and other measures of social and economic well being.

He wants his foundation to help build infrastructure – like schools, hospitals, clinics, bridges and roads – that the government isn’t providing. He also hopes to gain followers once he gets to Brazil to help him with his work.

“I want to talk to people, create a group and go around and find out what the major needs are in the state, and that can be our first project,” Mareno said. While he has plenty of supporters at home helping him find contacts in Latin America, he’s on his own in his travels.

Mareno said he hopes to get access to international funds and use them in Brazil – he said he can apply for grants from international organizations and from richer countries like Sweden and the U.S. Also, during his travels he hopes to meet with influential people who can help. For instance, he met with two presidents of non-governmental organizations while in Mexico City to get them interested in his project.

Mareno, who admits the move was pretty spontaneous, said he just realized it was a good time in his life to go back to Brazil. He’s young, unmarried and doesn’t have kids yet, so there was nothing but a job holding him back in D.C.

“I believe that we all have a purpose in life and somehow we all know what it is,” he said. “It’s inside of us and slowly we get to realize it. It was a puzzle for me. I knew I wanted to go to Brazil and wanted to do something to help my country.”

The first thing he did after making the decision to go was send an e-mail to friends asking for contacts in the area because he needed places to stay while he scoured Central and Latin America. He said while some people told him he was crazy, he got over 500 e-mail replies with encouraging words.

“Some others were skeptical about risking everything,” he said. “I have nothing left in the U.S. All I have right now is a handbag and that’s it. But that’s all I really need.”

Mareno has stayed with families, in hostels and a church in his travels so far, mostly because of contacts friends from home gave him. He is using his camera that has a video function to document his interviews and experiences, which he hopes will help him when he’s setting up the foundation in Brazil.

“I managed in Santilo (Mexico) to speak with someone who is starting his own business and he told me what is needed for the process,” he said. “And I stayed with a family in Agua Prieta (Mexico) who worked for the municipality and they showed me all around the city and told me what they accomplished in three years.”

He is staying two to three days in each city and is traveling by bus, train or by hitchhiking to stay as close to the people as possible – no hotels or airplane and no tourist sightseeing on this trip. So far his most telling experience was in Mexico City, where riots are occurring because the July 2 presidential election was inconclusive.

“I’m trying to figure out the stuff that is going on, to bring me to understand the reality of it all,” he said.

Mareno is no stranger to helping others. After his freshman year, he founded Books for Africa, a student organization that donates textbooks to the country, after he noticed students were throwing books away that couldn’t be sold back to the bookstore or street vendors on campus. The organization, which has collected over 40,000 books to date, later expanded to work with other D.C.-area universities, and some even started their own chapters.

Also, while working for two years at the Cuban lobbying organization, he worked on several projects including sending books and medicine to the island.

“I thought, if I’m capable of doing this maybe I can do something more,” he said.

His next stop: Oaxec, Mexico, a city that’s been in civil conflict for the last three months. He hopes to be settled in Brazil by mid-December and have his organization up and running within a few years.