Cousins as Companions!!

Sister Amorim, Sister Marlie Hillam (mais nova), Sister Madison Hillam, President Amorim
Cousins serving together for Sister Madison Hillam's last transfer

Ahhh I'm finally in Portugal!! We left last Monday morning and got there Tuesday afternoon. We have the best mission president in the world! He and his wife are so sincere and they speak English--so that's great.

Now onto the juicy details...

My companion is... wait for it...... Sister Hillam!! Yeah no joke! My companion is my cousin, Madi Hillam! She extended her mission to train me (which I didn't know). So here's how it happened. I got off the airplane in Porto and got my bags and then we went and met the President. While waiting for the elevator, President Amorim says, "You're cousin is waiting for you!" And I was like whaaaat?? Then he said that she was going to train me and that she extended 6 weeks. Sister Amorim quickly told him that I wasn't supposed to know and she made me promise to act super surprised!! haha!! I was freaking out for about 24 hours because I wasn't going to see Madi until the next day. Then I walked into the chapel and she was there. There was screaming, hugging, and more screaming. Everyone was watching which was super funny. Then we went onto training and such. 

We got into Viseu after 2 hours in a bus. Viseu is BEAUTIFUL!!!! So much green and the houses are all so old! I love it here! It's also so much fun to hear all their accents. I thought I could understand Portuguese but uhh noooo it's rough. But the last few days have been a lot better. 

On Thursday, we went out to eat with a recently released missionary's family. It was real Portuguese food and it was amazing!! Then on Friday, we ended up teaching a Jehovah's Witness and a Spiritualist. Very interesting experiences.. We also got to see our new apartment! We're moving since our apartment is kinda sketchy. We have the best view in the new one and we're right next to two giant Catholic churches! Saturday was super weird. We taught a lesson in the morning and then for the rest of the day, all of our plans fell through and no one was on the streets or in their houses. Super odd. Portugal played Croatia in the EuroCup and won! We were getting ready for bed when they won. The people in the streets went CRAZY!! 

Then for church yesterday. Bishop asked me to bare my testimony in Sacrament meeting and that was pretty fun. It was funny to see the members' reactions when we would introduce ourselves. This is how it goes.. Everytime.. without fail..

Madi -Hi! I'm Sister Hillam
me -And I'm Sister Hillam too! 
(long stare at our name tags)
Me -We're cousins!
Them-You guys look alike!
Madi -Yup.. We're cousins!
Them -You have very pretty eyes (haha super random but it happens everytime)

It's hilarious! The members are so great here! We had pancake night last night at a member's house with all the missionaries in our district. It was so much fun! 

Also today for P-day we went church jumping and went to 3 different Catholic churches! They were so beautiful!! And then we got ice cream and sat in our new house on the floor. It was great to just relax.

I love Portugal!! I'm soo excited to be here for 18 months! And to have such an amazing companion to train me! 

Much love to everyone!!
Sister Hillam (mais nova)

New Companionship!

P-Day Visits to Cathedrals in Viseu, Portugal

Hillam's and Ice Cream (chocolate and nuts)!

Sisters in Viseu

Sister Marlie Hillam, Sister Madison Hillam, and Pres. Jose Pais and Family
Marlie's and Madi's Grandfather set Pres. Pais apart as a Stake President years ago!

Two Days left!--Provo MTC

Ola!!

Well actually less than two days!!! It's so crazy that I'll actually be in Portugal in a few days. I'm sooo ready to get out of the MTC. It's been great, don't get me wrong but six weeks is a long time to be in a classroom for 9+ hours a day. 

Anyways.. This week's been kinda crazy. 

Tuesday, we got to hear from Elder Soares and his wife. When I saw his picture on the big screen I flipped out. It was like that part from Elf when Buddy is told that Santa is coming and he screams, "SANTA'S COMING? I KNOOOOW HIM!" (that was a rough quotation) Yeah that was me. Elder Soares spoke about obedience and Sister Soares spoke in Portuguese while Elder Soares translated. She has the sweetest testimony and I was able to understand her! It was awesome :) Also, while he was translating for her, she switched into English and he just started repeating what she said into English. It was hilarious! Afterwards, I got to talk to them and get a picture with them. Brazilians are the greatest and happiest people in the world!

Yesterday we got to do TRC again through Skype!! We talked to this girl in Lisboa who moved there from Angola about 7 years ago. Her name's Isabel. She's amazing!! She's probably about 18 years old and she's planning on serving a mission in January. We talked to her about gratitude and not being afraid to share the Gospel with others. And surprise! She already has a friend who's meeting with the missionaries. I'm kinda sad that I won't get to see her in Portugal. Also, Sister Nance and I could understand her so that's a plus! But man..that accent is so strange sounding.. 

We had to say goodbye to our teachers today. That was so sad.. Irmão Barlow and Irmão Read are seriously amazing. They have helped me grow so much in my testimony and help me really learn Portuguese. Ahh they were the best! We gave them thank you cards and chocolate because as missionaries, we think that's the best present in the world :)

Well, we leave on Monday at around 3:50am to start our 24 hours of travel! Super duper excited.. Wish us luck!

Quero prestar meu testamunhoa vocês. Sou muita grata pela oportunidade para estar aqui no CTM e para servir uma missão. Sei que esta igreja é verdadeira e que se nós tentarmos a ser melhores cada dia, vamos a receber ajuda de nosso Pai Celestial. Sei que Deus ama-nos muito e que nós podemos confiar em Ele sempre. Eu amo esta igreja e eu amo as pessoas na Portugal!! 

Com amor, 
Sister Hillam
A Igreja é verdadeira!!

Sister Nance and I with Elder and Sister Soares

Our picture with Irmao Read and Irmao Barlow (left to right)

Actually Portugues sardines!  Yum!  They actually weren't that bad!

We are actually copying what we were doing in the picture that we're holding!

We took a picture of our district each week and for our last week, we're holding each picture. Picture-ception!

Week 5--Provo MTC

Lots of things happened this week so sorry if it's kinda jumbled around! Desculpa!!

Elder Bednar came!!! He gave the most amazing devotional! It was all about "the one." God knows each of us personally and he knows exactly how to help us and it is our job as missionaries and as children of God to go out and find "the one" and help them come unto Christ and understand their divine nature, that they are also children of God. It was AMAZING! At the end we got to sing his song "One by One" and man.. that was such a humbling experience. Words cannot describe.. 

President Burgess of the MTC came into our Sacrament meeting yesterday. He has a sweet spot for us Portuguese speakers since he served in Brazil. He shared this scripture from 2 Nephi 31:3 in the Book of Mormon:

"3 For my soul delighteth in plainness; for after this manner doth the Lord God work among the children of men. For the Lord God giveth light unto the understanding; for he speaketh unto men according to their language, unto their understanding." 

He related this to how we are as missionaries right now. Our Portuguese isn't amazing right now but that's okay because the Lord delights in plainness. We always talk about how we're called Portuguese speaking because the Lord knows that if we were speaking English, we would "information throw up" on our investigators and tell them too much about super deep things. I'm so grateful that I have to blessing to learn this amazing language. It's so beautiful!! (especially if it's the continental accent haha sorry mom)

So we were playing Frisbee outside during exercise time and just casually passing it around in a circle with the Elders and someone threw this beautiful throw my way and I totally thought I was going to catch it but nope. Somehow my hands missed it and it went straight into my nose. Now I have a great purple bruise on my nose. How fun!

Our teacher, Irmão Read, challenged us to only speak in Portuguese for 24 hours. Man it was so hard!! And we definitely weren't perfect but it was great practice and helped us realize how much we actually do know!

We got to Skype a real Portuguese person last week!! Her name was Dalila and she lives in Oreias or something like that. She was super sweet! But sadly the correction was TERRIBLE! But we could feel the Spirit when we were teaching her and we knew that she could too. She was adorable!! I already love the Portuguese people!!

We also got our itineraries!! We're heading to Portugal early Monday morning!! ahhhh so excited!

I also realized this this week: We are called to preach the Gospel BECAUSE Christ lives!! We do everything BECAUSE He lives! If he had never atoned for our sins and be resureccted, we would have no purpose in this life. We would have no need to share the Gospel. BECAUSE of Him, our lives have purpose and we can truly experience joy in this life. 

Eu amo esta igreja e eu sei que esta é verdedeira. Eu amo meu Salvador e Redentor. Através de Jesus Cristo, eu posso vencer todos meus problemas e desafios nesta vida. Eu quero que todas pessoas tinha na oportunidade para ouvir esta mesagem de esperança e amor. A Igreja de Jesus Cristo dos Santos dos Ultimos Dias é verdadeira!

Com amor,

Sister Hillam

The Continental Sisters Week 5!!

We had a little BYU YSA 106th Ward Reunion!

Sisters!!!

Found Marissa!!

Portugal Here We Come!!

The OG Sisters!

We've been in Utah too long!!

Week 4--Provo Missionary Training Center: Pirate Hymns

Ola todos!

It's been a great great great week!! Lots of learning and lots of exciting things are going on!

So our teacher, Irmão Barlow told us about an awesome hymn in the Portuguese Hymn book: Secreta Oracão aka Secret Prayer. So usually when we sing it in English, it's kinda boring but wow something about singing in Portuguese just makes it so much fun to sing. The only problem is that when we're singing, we sometimes get a little too excited and we feel kinda like Pirates singing on a ship. Also, there's this song that's only in the Portuguese hymnbook that also reminds us of pirates which I guess makes sense because Portugal = ships = pirates, right?

One of our elders, Elder Comeau, is colorblind which is super fun. SO we have these Purple language books and one has all these phrases in it. Our teacher had mentioned it in passing and I thought we all knew what it was. Once we were asked to pull it out during class and Elder Comeau gasped and said, "That book?!" Then he sat back and was quiet for a second. We asked why and he said, "I thought it was blue and I've been looking for a purple book for the past four weeks!" We love our color blind Elder. 

We were planning our lesson for Campeão and randomly Sister Nance says, "I think we should sing to him." I was like uhh okay... whatever you say! So we ended up singing "I am a Child of God" to him and it really invited the Spirit. Aaand we taught a completely unscripted lesson and talked about things we didn't really know how to say in Portuguese and it was awesome! Yay for the Gift of Tongues! Our teacher, Irmão Read, told us that if we enter a lesson without notes, we are exercising our faith in Christ. When we exercise our faith in Christ, we will see miracles!

ALSO.. Sheri Dew spoke to us last night at devotional! So awesome! Sister Nance and I got to meet and talk to her! SOO COOL! She talked about how it's okay if we have questions as long as we approach it the right way. Elder Bednar comes tomorrow!!!! 

We get to Skype a real Portuguese/Brazilian member on Friday and teach them a lesson! So excited! I'll let ya'll know how that goes :)

Ahh last night we watched Legacy which is about a girl and her life during the beginnings of the Church. I saw it a long time ago and I used to love it but wow.. didn't realize how cheesy it was. Every time someone said something that was "flirtatious" or cheesy, the whole room would burst out laughing! It was great!

2 MORE WEEKS UNTIL PORTUGAL! CRAZY! We're all feeling ready to get out of the MTC and into the mission field!

A igreja é verdadeira!

Com amor,

Sister Hillam

Sister Nance and I were somewhat matching!

We had a matching America Day for our District!

I was the only one awake on Sunday so I took pictures of everyone sleeping!

I had to.....