Charlotte

Jamie and I have been in Charlotte, NC the since Wednesday attending an introductory session with SIM.  There are about 40 other people here getting to know SIM and deciding if missions are right for them and their families.  We leave this afternoon and I'll post more in the next couple days about the past 4 days, but I wanted to give a couple pictures and one story.

We are staying on a residence building on their campus with about 30 of the people.  One of the families we met adopted a boy from Ethiopia last year.  They said they had a neighbor who came up to them and asked them about the adoption and where they were adopting from.  It went something like this:

Neighbor: So where are you adopting from?

T&L: We're adopting from Ethiopia.

Neighbor:  Where's that at?

T&L:  It is in East Africa.

Neighbor: ...Did you know...that the baby might be black???

One other quick comment on Ethiopians.  SIM has done a wonderful job of reaching the Nation of Ethiopia the past few years.  Ethiopians are starting to travel throughout Africa and witness to other Africans.  Right now there are a couple in Sudan working with SIM.  When they first arrived, the Sudanese didn't want to talk to them because "they didn't associate with arabs".  It took awhile for SIM to convince the Sudanese that they were really African due to their lighter skin.

So here are some random pictures from yesterday.  Not a real good set, but it gives you an idea for the campus and people we've been meeting with. http://picasaweb.google.com/Lairdpictures/SIM