Miss Argentina and Miss Puerto Rico have married secretly
Mariana Varela, Miss Argentina, and Fabiola Valentn, Miss Puerto Rico, announced their engagement and marriage on the same day, Sunday.
According to Univision, the two met during the 2020 Miss Grand International competition, when they were both competitors. Since the pandemic hit in 2020, the beauty contest was already moved to March 2021.
Varela also participated in this year’s Miss Universe competition, wearing a show-stopping ensemble in the national costume competition.
Although neither Varela nor Valentn took home a trophy from the 2020 Grand Miss International pageant, as they announced in their Instagram biographies, it appears that they each found the love of their lives there.
In the months after they first met at the pageant, Varela and Valentn uploaded images of themselves with each other on Instagram, but they did not indicate that they were dating.
In September of 2021, on Valentn’s birthday, Varela wrote a post in which she referred to Valentn as her “lovely friend.”
The couple made the Instagram announcement of their wedding on Sunday.
They accompanied a video collage of memorable moments from their relationship with the words, “After deciding to keep our relationship private, we opened the doors to them on a special day.”
The film looked to be shot entirely in Puerto Rico and featured both the proposal and the wedding.
Several of Varela and Valentn’s fellow contestants, including Abena Akuaba, the winner of the 2020 Miss Grand International pageant from Ghana, sent their best wishes for the couple in the comments section of their Instagram.
‘Omg congratulations MGI brought together a beautiful union,’ Akuaba said.