Sometime in the first quarter of 2001, I was late for my flight out of Washington, DC to New Orleans. Being the last one to board, I was assigned the only remaining seat on the plane in the Economy Plus section. As I boarded the plane, I immediately recognized the man in the aisle seat next to my assigned middle seat was Senator John McCain.

The Senator stood to allow me to sit down and as I buckled myself in (and surrendered the arm rest!) I realized this was probably the only time in my life I would have a senator strapped to a seat next to me for three hours :)

So I said "I'm sorry Senator, but I must tell you about this program I help run in central Vietnam...." and I proceded to show him photos of Clear Path and all that... CPI was still very young, so I asked if I could get an endorsement letter for our efforts in approaching donors... and he gave me a couple of numbers to call ("if this person is busy, then call this person")... so ... anyway... he wrote this letter for us after checking us out.

I was reminded of this story after reading of Cindy McCain visiting Cambodia with our firends at the HALO trust. You can read more about her trip here.

She said of her trip:

I look forward to continuing to work with organizations that better the quality of life for children and families across the globe.

Cindy, give us a call!