The Bridge: The Life And Rise Of Barack Obama Part 3

Constance Ramos, whose background is Filipino-Hungarian, wrote, "I never once thought of Barry as 'Black.' I still don't. On a very deep, emotional level, I honestly don't know what 'Black' means: Why is Barry supposed to fall into that 'color' category, when his skin tone is just about the same as mine? n.o.body would call me 'black.' It remains unclear to me why skin color is so important to so many people." She said she felt "betrayed" by Obama's angst-ridden self-portrayal. is Filipino-Hungarian, wrote, "I never once thought of Barry as 'Black.' I still don't. On a very deep, emotional level, I honestly don't know what 'Black' means: Why is Barry supposed to fall into that 'color' category, when his skin tone is just about the same as mine? n.o.body would call me 'black.' It remains unclear to me why skin color is so important to so many people." She said she felt "betrayed" by Obama's angst-ridden self-portrayal.

There are very few writers and observers about the Punahou scene who allow even a tinge of anxiety, an element of darkness, to cloud the sunny self-regard. The novelist Allegra Goodman is an exception, describing a place where the walls of privilege were manned at all times and nearly impregnable: The lovely tropical home of so many diverse people is not beyond distinctions--it is all about them. Tensions simmer between native Hawaiians and newcomers. The rich layered cultures of Polynesia, Asia, and America b.u.mp up against bigotry and ignorance, often voiced in racist jokes and sometimes expressed in physical violence. Punahou's student body is multicultural, and its financial aid generous. But, for some, Punahou symbolizes exclusive privilege. More than once when I was a student there, rough kids from outside breached the walls. Teachers sounded the alarm: "The mokes are on campus again"--the word "mokes" designating kids who were native and poor. of so many diverse people is not beyond distinctions--it is all about them. Tensions simmer between native Hawaiians and newcomers. The rich layered cultures of Polynesia, Asia, and America b.u.mp up against bigotry and ignorance, often voiced in racist jokes and sometimes expressed in physical violence. Punahou's student body is multicultural, and its financial aid generous. But, for some, Punahou symbolizes exclusive privilege. More than once when I was a student there, rough kids from outside breached the walls. Teachers sounded the alarm: "The mokes are on campus again"--the word "mokes" designating kids who were native and poor.

In high school, Barry eventually stopped writing letters to his father. His effort to understand himself was a lonely one. Touchingly, awkwardly, he was giving himself instruction on how to be black. According to his math and science teacher, Pal Eldredge, the way Barry carried himself changed. "His gait, the way he walked, changed," he said. "And I wasn't the only one who noticed." Step by step he began immersing himself in an African-American culture that seemed to live thousands of miles from where he was. He listened to Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder, Grover Washington and Miles Davis; he watched "Soul Train" and Richard Pryor on television. On his own he read Richard Wright's Native Son Native Son, the poems of Langston Hughes, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, The Souls of Black Folk The Autobiography of Malcolm X, The Souls of Black Folk, the essays of James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man Invisible Man.

Obama could not, and did not, pretend to be starting his journey from the neighborhood. Honolulu was hardly Detroit or Lansing, the South Side or Harlem--much less the hamlets of the Mississippi Delta--but he did not escape moments of real racial humiliation. He fleetingly mentions one incident, when he was eleven or twelve, that one white cla.s.smate, Kristen Caldwell, recounted many years later in far greater detail: When I started reading more about Barack Obama's early years at Punahou, my first instinct was that the racial issues were exaggerated. Then I realized that I really would have had no way of knowing what his experience, his perception had been--just as he wouldn't be aware of mine. I did remember one incident very vividly: We were standing on the more about Barack Obama's early years at Punahou, my first instinct was that the racial issues were exaggerated. Then I realized that I really would have had no way of knowing what his experience, his perception had been--just as he wouldn't be aware of mine. I did remember one incident very vividly: We were standing on the lanai lanai (patio) looking at the draw sheets that had just been posted for a tennis tournament ... (patio) looking at the draw sheets that had just been posted for a tennis tournament ...Everyone does the same thing: You look for your name, and then run your finger across the draw to see whom you might play as you advance into later rounds of the tournament ...Barry was doing what we all did, completely normal behavior. But Tom M. came over and told him not to touch the draw sheet because he would get it dirty. He singled him out, and the implication was absolutely clear: Barry's hands weren't grubby; the message was that his darker skin would somehow soil the draw. Those of us standing there were agape, horrified, disbelieving ...Barry handled it beautifully, with just the right amount of cold burn without becoming disrespectful. "What do you mean by that?" he asked firmly. I could see in his eyes that Tom realized he had gone too far--his remark was uncalled for; he had crossed a line--and there were witnesses. He fumbled in his response, ultimately claiming that he had only been joking. But we all knew it had been no joke, and it wasn't even remotely funny.Some of our innocence was gone: That was the price of an ugly remark, one I've never forgotten.

It wasn't a singular incident. In the ninth grade, cla.s.smate Ronald Loui recalled, a physical-education teacher advised the students to change their style of running. "You should try to run like a black man," the teacher said. "Not so straight up, tilt your pelvis!" Obama, the only black kid in the cla.s.s, "was really embarra.s.sed but, in part to get away from the uncomfortable situation, he took off running," Loui said.

In high school, Obama found a few older black friends to talk with. He spent some time with Keith Kakugawa--"Ray" in the memoir--but Keith's bitter monologues about "the white man" seemed to do little but stoke Obama's anger and confusion. (As an adult, Kakugawa spent seven years in prison on drug and auto-theft charges. When he started making trouble When he started making trouble for the Obama campaign--telling reporters that for the Obama campaign--telling reporters that Dreams Dreams was inaccurate and asking for money--one spokesman, Bill Burton, said, "There's no doubt that Keith's story is tragic and sad.") was inaccurate and asking for money--one spokesman, Bill Burton, said, "There's no doubt that Keith's story is tragic and sad.") But while Obama's most constant comrades--Greg Orme, Bobby t.i.tcomb, and Mike Ramos--were not black, he had valuable friendships with two older African-American Punahou students: Rik Smith, who is now a physician, and Tony Peterson, who works for the United Methodist Church. The three of them would gather weekly outside Cooke Hall for what they jokingly called Ethnic Corner. They talked about cla.s.ses, philosophy, race--and not least how race affected their ability to date Punahou girls, who were nearly all either white, Asian, or mixed race. They asked each other what it meant to "act white" or "act black." They even discussed whether there would be a black President in their lifetime--and they decided that it wasn't possible.

Often they just talked about the same mysteries that bewitch anyone at that age. In the spring of 1976, Tony tape-recorded one session of the Ethnic Corner because he had to write a school essay on the subject of time; he thought he might collect some material from the others: RIK: Have you guys ever thought about time?BARRY: Yeah.TONY: I thought about it.RIK: Think about time, okay. What is it? What is time?TONY: I don't know.BARRY: Eh. Time is just a collection of human.... listen, this is gonna sound good, boy! See, time is just a collection of human experiences combined so that they make a long, flowing stream of thought.

The dialogue is "No Exit" meets "Fast Times at Ridgemont High." "We were three black guys trying to impress each other with how smart we were," Peterson said, laughing. "We weren't s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g around, we weren't playing the dozens. We were challenging each other."

They also formed a means of protection for each other, Rik Smith said. Punahou thought of itself as an exemplar of multicultural comity, but Smith, who was two years older than Obama, described a Halloween celebration at Punahou where a couple of students came in blackface and tattered clothing--"minstrel stuff." The kids who had dressed up had no idea that they had done anything racist. In fact, they were offended that Rik took offense. How could they be racist when their hearts were pure? Nearly all teenagers tend to think of themselves as outsiders--there is solace in it, loneliness is transformed into a variety of glamour--but Obama, Smith, and Peterson were always talking among themselves about whether or not they were black first or individuals first. The answers provided by the Punahou School were confusing.

"Barack's experience was my experience," Smith said. "I talk to my kids about this and my kids can't imagine it in California. As a child in Seattle, I couldn't play at recess because the kids wouldn't let me play baseball. One of the funny stories that I recall is that a haole haole girl that I liked, a nice individual, would never go out with me. It was weird because I would go sneak into her room at home past midnight and then I would go. But she wouldn't talk to me in school. It was an girl that I liked, a nice individual, would never go out with me. It was weird because I would go sneak into her room at home past midnight and then I would go. But she wouldn't talk to me in school. It was an interesting interesting activity." activity."

The subjects of the Ethnic Corner were hardly ephemeral. "When Barry gave the speech at the Democratic Convention in 2004 and talked about wanting to eradicate the idea that if a black kid has a book he's acting white--that was a huge part of what we were talking about back in high school," Tony Peterson said. "Kids wrestle with their ident.i.ties. And if you are biracial and look black and grow up in a white family, the issues are deep."

Ronald Loui, who is Chinese-American, said, "People in Hawaii have no real access to an understanding of the black-white divide. So many of the icons of that era were black. We were all listening to Earth, Wind & Fire and we all pretended that we were Dr. J on the basketball court, and yet there were parents who were telling their kids to watch out for black people."

Barry's mother visited Honolulu when she could or brought him to Indonesia during school breaks when she could afford it, but Barry was growing up on the margins of her vision. He could still appreciate her energy, her sweetness, and her intelligence, but she had little to offer now about what troubled him most. When she naively tried to find common ground with her son--"You know, I don't feel feel white!"--he only got disgusted at her attempt. Living in Indonesia, Ann Dunham had become fixed on the axioms, the hopes, and the mood of the early civil-rights days; she had precious little feel for what had come after: the mutual resentments, Black Power, the Panthers, the clashes over busing and affirmative action. white!"--he only got disgusted at her attempt. Living in Indonesia, Ann Dunham had become fixed on the axioms, the hopes, and the mood of the early civil-rights days; she had precious little feel for what had come after: the mutual resentments, Black Power, the Panthers, the clashes over busing and affirmative action. "I remember her feeling saddened "I remember her feeling saddened by the anger that she sensed in parts of the African-American community," Obama said. by the anger that she sensed in parts of the African-American community," Obama said.

How could Ann possibly know what it was to be a black man in America--and who, besides a few teenagers no less confused than he, was around to help? "Some of the problems of adolescent rebellion "Some of the problems of adolescent rebellion and hormones were compounded by the fact that I didn't have a father," Obama said. "So what I fell into were the exaggerated stereotypes of black male behavior--not focusing on my books, finding respectability, playing a lot of sports." and hormones were compounded by the fact that I didn't have a father," Obama said. "So what I fell into were the exaggerated stereotypes of black male behavior--not focusing on my books, finding respectability, playing a lot of sports."

"We were all a little untethered untethered," Maya Soetoro-Ng says. Maya, who lived with Ann in Indonesia while Barry attended Punahou, said that she and her older brother struggled with their rootlessness in different ways. "We went to a lot of places--four, five months at a time," including Pakistan, Thailand, India, she said. "Long enough to get a sense of the textures of the place and really know it a bit. I have tremendous wanderl.u.s.t. Until 2004, when I became a mother, at age thirty-four, the wanderl.u.s.t eased but it didn't go away. Now its voice is very soft. I think Barack was less in love with it. He had greater examples, in our grandparents and elsewhere, of the beauty of claiming community, of being grounded, of being loyal, of being in one place and really working on the relationship with that place and the people in it. I think that became very desirable to him. I can't speak for him but probably some of our mother's decisions may have looked selfish in comparison."

As an adult, Obama always expressed deep love for his mother--he readily acknowledged her influence as the most powerful in his young life--but he could also step back and evaluate critically the choices she made as a young woman. "When I think about my mother "When I think about my mother," he said during the campaign, "I think there was a certain combination of being very grounded in who she was, what she believed in. But also a certain recklessness. I think she was always searching for something. She wasn't comfortable seeing her life confined to a certain box."

Maya doesn't believe her mother was aware of her son's crisis of ident.i.ty as he navigated Punahou. "I'm sure part of our mother's optimism was a constant reminder to both of us that we were special because we came from more than one world and we could access many worlds easily," she says. "When we struggled with not feeling entirely at home here or there, I think that she would push an optimistic perspective of things. My brother has never been one to air his grievances or talk about things that were troubling him. He is one of these people who work things out in their own solitary way. He works it out by walking and thinking. He has never been neurotic."

During Barry's last three years at Punahou, Ann worked in Jakarta doing the fieldwork for her doctoral dissertation in anthropology. Once she finished her master's, however, her interest was more in gaining the knowledge and expertise needed to work in the field of international development. She did not complete the dissertation until 1992, when she was fifty. In the meantime, as she did research and wrote, she worked in development jobs for the Ford Foundation and the World Bank, and as research coordinator for Bank Rakyat, a leading Indonesian bank. at Punahou, Ann worked in Jakarta doing the fieldwork for her doctoral dissertation in anthropology. Once she finished her master's, however, her interest was more in gaining the knowledge and expertise needed to work in the field of international development. She did not complete the dissertation until 1992, when she was fifty. In the meantime, as she did research and wrote, she worked in development jobs for the Ford Foundation and the World Bank, and as research coordinator for Bank Rakyat, a leading Indonesian bank.

A disarmingly gregarious personality, Ann knew many foreign diplomats, business people, and development officers, but more and more she came to immerse herself in the life of Indonesians--in Jakarta and in the provinces. Her marriage was strained. Lolo moved increasingly into the international oil business, with its office meetings and golf games and c.o.c.ktail parties. Ann was repelled by the wealthy, ent.i.tled foreigners in their midst who spent their time complaining about the servants, "the locals," and maximizing the ways they could make Jakarta more like "home." Ann's Indonesian was fluent. She invited interesting people to the house for dinner: artists, writers, development officers. She started making frequent trips out of the capital to the regional centers, especially the villages of central Java near Yogyakarta.

"She home-schooled me and took me to the villages," Maya said. "Blacksmith villages, tile factories, clove cigarette factories, ceramic villages, basket-weaving villages--all manner of textiles and cottage industries." It was an interesting, engaged life, but it did have one distinct cost. Obama admits that, much as he tried to deny it at the time, the separations from his mother took their toll. "I didn't feel [her absence] "I didn't feel [her absence] as a deprivation," he said. "But when I think about the fact that I was separated from her, I suspect it had more of an impact than I know." as a deprivation," he said. "But when I think about the fact that I was separated from her, I suspect it had more of an impact than I know."

The disconnection--and time--had a way of catching them all by surprise. When he was in high school, Barry arrived alone at the airport in Jakarta for a summer stay with Ann and Maya. Ann had a panicky feeling as she searched the arrivals area for her son. Somehow, in her mind, Barry was still chubby-cheeked, stocky, not especially tall, and now he was nowhere to be found. Had he slipped by her and wandered off somewhere in the airport? Not likely. Had he missed the plane?

"And then comes this ... figure! Tall and handsome--another person!" person!" Ann's friend and academic adviser, Alice Dewey, recalled. "Suddenly he was towering over her and speaking in this very low newly-acquired man's voice. The voice that everyone knows nowadays!" Ann's friend and academic adviser, Alice Dewey, recalled. "Suddenly he was towering over her and speaking in this very low newly-acquired man's voice. The voice that everyone knows nowadays!"

From the mid-seventies on, Alice Dewey was Ann's "mother hen," both an intimate friend and her academic mentor. When Alice visited Jakarta or, later, Yogyakarta, she often stayed with Ann. Alice Dewey is the granddaughter of the American philosopher John Dewey. Her office, in Saunders Hall, at the University of Hawaii, is small, the sort of alarmingly cluttered warren that always seems one piece of paper away from crashing down and crushing its inhabitant to death. A friendly woman with a white corona of curls and a sharp smile, Dewey sits in a creaky desk chair surrounded by stacks of ancient memos, bulging files, dusty dissertations, each teeteringly perched on the next. Like so many of Ann's friends and acquaintances, she remembers her as restless, curious, funny, tirelessly idealistic. Dewey was angry at the occasional depiction of Dunham during the campaign as a flighty idealist who "ignored" her son to pursue her own muses. "She adored adored that child," she said, "and they were in constant touch. And he that child," she said, "and they were in constant touch. And he adored adored her." her."

It pained Ann to be apart from Barry for such long stretches, Alice Dewey said, but Ann really believed that it was possible to live an unconventional life and still find a way for her children to grow up into whole, independent people. She struck Alice Dewey as a mature student, somebody with a sense of intellectual penetration long before she even embarked on her dissertation. "She was one of those students that you think, 'Why don't I let her lecture?'"

Both Dewey and Dunham were deeply interested in the lives and the futures of the craftsmen of central Java. They studied not only their art, but also the effect of modernization on their way of life. Would village craftsmen disappear? Dunham's research and her point of view was a kind of implicit argument with Clifford Geertz and other anthropologists, who believed that village craftsmen were, for various cultural reasons, destined for extinction. Where Geertz saw dispirited, tradition-bound irrationality among villagers, Dunham saw potential vitality. She was convinced that, with the help of modest financing from banks and non-governmental organizations, cottage industries in rural Indonesia could not only sustain ancient crafts and traditions but also provide a strong alternative economy to agriculture. Her mode of work--socially engaged, policy-directed--was hardly fashionable when she was doing her research, yet her conclusions proved prescient. Blacksmithing was just one of the Javanese crafts that began to expand in the nineteen-eighties. The idea of providing microcredits to craftsmen and to small, rural enterprises is common currency in the twenty-first century; it was a fairly radical and unconventional idea when Dunham championed it.

At first, Ann studied a wide range of crafts--weaving, batik, leather-work, puppetry, ironwork, ceramics, sculpture--and she wanted to include all of these crafts in her dissertation. She examined everything from the way motifs from the Hindu epics were applied to resist-dye batiks to the intricate construction of bamboo birdcages. She tried to cover vast scholarly territory and numerous villages in central Java. "When she came to write her proposal for her dissertation, we told her, for G.o.d's sake, choose one," Dewey recalled. "She chose blacksmithing. Iron lives in the ground and so you can talk about the mythological dimensions of the craft, too." Javanese blacksmithing is an art with a history that is more than a thousand years old, and Dunham was entranced by both the objects themselves and the lives of the craftsmen.

To do her research, Dunham had to insinuate her way into the smithies of Kajar, a village in Gunung Kidul, a region of central Java. When she first started visiting there in the late nineteen-seventies, the village had to be approached by foot for the last mile; electricity did not arrive in Kajar for another decade. The blacksmith's workshop, in Javanese tradition, is sacred and mostly barred to women. The craftsmen think of their work as a spiritual endeavor, their products as sacred as a crucifix or Torah scroll. Offerings are draped on the anvil. Dunham's work was, in many ways, economic anthropology, but she also had the requisite skill of a social anthropologist: the capacity to gain access. She persuaded these craftsmen to let her inside the smithy, observe their work, and interview them at length. She had a capacity to get She had a capacity to get these craftsmen to reveal even their innermost thoughts; in one pa.s.sage, Pak Sastro, the head of the blacksmithing cooperative in Kajar, describes a dream he had before being visited by the regional sultan. Because Dunham was American, she was regarded, above all, as a foreign guest and able to transcend, somehow, her status as a woman among men. these craftsmen to reveal even their innermost thoughts; in one pa.s.sage, Pak Sastro, the head of the blacksmithing cooperative in Kajar, describes a dream he had before being visited by the regional sultan. Because Dunham was American, she was regarded, above all, as a foreign guest and able to transcend, somehow, her status as a woman among men.

"She really earned their trust," Maya Soetoro-Ng said. "She knew their extended families and their children and grandchildren."

"The fact that she worked so closely with blacksmiths is proof of her subtlety as a person," Bronwen Solyom, a friend and expert in Indonesian art, said. "If she hadn't been so congenial, she wouldn't have been able to gain access to those men and their venerable skills."

Even though Dunham narrowed her topic to the smiths of central Java, her dissertation, "Peasant Blacksmithing in Indonesia: Surviving and Thriving Against All Odds," was over a thousand pages long in ma.n.u.script. (In 2009, Duke University Press published a condensed version edited by Alice Dewey and another of Dunham's colleagues, Nancy I. Cooper.) Dunham was an indefatigable researcher. Some pa.s.sages are so detailed and arcane that they nearly reach the level of parody, yet the dissertation reveals, in its study of a single village, the dense textures of culture inherent in any one place. To read it is to learn the history, beliefs, and skill of nearly every inhabitant of the village; its intricate and evolving social, religious, and cla.s.s structures; its cultural formation through centuries of foreign and indigenous influence. At times it seems that the reader learns more here about the Indonesian keris keris, the daggers made by the smiths--about iron forging, iron casting, silver and gold smithing---than about the fall of Rome in Gibbon. But one cannot help admiring both the complexity of Kajar and the industry of Ann Dunham. It's clear from the text that Dunham became intimate friends with everyone there: Pak Paeran, the village headman; Pak Sastrosuyono, the leading blacksmithing entrepreneur; the artisans; the bureaucrats. There is an evident affection for the people she writes about and an obvious hope that the Indonesian government, along with international aid and development inst.i.tutions, will help insure the continuing health of small handicraft industries, as an element both of cultural continuity and of economic diversity. Dunham's text seems directed as much to the agencies and bureaucracies that might help the people of Kajar and other Indonesian villagers as to her fellow scholars. "There is a balance there of intimacy and objectivity," Maya Soetoro-Ng said. "She tried to combat others who were simplistic or patronizing to the craftsmen. She emphasized applied anthropology, the idea that this work should be about making lives better."

In her letters to Dewey, Ann Dunham wrote about her encounters; she wrote with news about her a.s.sistants and sources, academic gossip, even updates on the latest Dorothy Sayers mysteries that she was reading as a diversion. On July 28, 1978, while Barry was a junior at Punahou, Dunham wrote to Dewey from Indonesia: Dear Alice,I finally got back to Gunung Kidul, finishing up our work last week, exhausted but quite satisfied with the results. Kajar is certainly an interesting village from several points of view, not the least of which is political. I can envision a little article someday with a model of the balance of power there and the shifts affected by various styles of tinkering from outside....We stayed at the house of Pak Rianto ... [who] in turn rents part of the house of a man called Pak Harjo Bodong (Roughly translated "Father Harjo with the Long Belly b.u.t.ton," though I never had the courage to really ask why.) Pak Harjo Bodong used to be the most famous [smith] in the Wonosari area. He also used to be a famous thief and was in jail four times when he was young.... Lives there with his twelfth wife (he is her tenth husband). They are both in their seventies and quite a sketch....We arrived in Kajar just at the time of the peanut harvest. This meant that at every house we surveyed we were given large gla.s.ses of sticky tea, refilled at least 3 times despite all my "sampuns," and big plates of peanuts in the sh.e.l.l to consume ... [I won't] ever be able to look a peanut in the face again (yes, peanuts do do have faces--smirky, nasty little faces, in fact).... have faces--smirky, nasty little faces, in fact)....I forgot to mention that we grew very fond of Pak Atmo Sadiman dukoh of Kajar.... He was giving me a new Javanese name, "Sri Lestari." I gather it means "Forever Beautiful," and wasn't that gallant of him. Thank G.o.d for nice comfortable middle-aged men who don't give you any complexes. Amen! ...Reading over this letter it sounds rather flippant. It's the influence, I think, of Lord Peter Wimsey who kept me sane all through my weeks in Gunung Kidul. Especially liked Gaudy Night. Unnatural Death Gaudy Night. Unnatural Death was fun but less padded out with good tidbits.... was fun but less padded out with good tidbits....I haven't seen a newspaper or a magazine for the last month, so if anything exciting has happened you might let me know....Aloha,Ann Dunham decorated her house with keris keris, puppets, prints, and paintings. "Ann loved beautiful things, but not as a connoisseur," Solyom said. "She was a supporter of all kinds of craftsmen, and she collected the things people she knew made." When, years later, Mich.e.l.le and Barack Obama set up house in Chicago, their decorations included Indonesian prints.

In order to be close to the villages that she was studying, Ann stayed in Yogyakarta and made trips to the villages on the arid plateau of south central Java. Lolo visited frequently, but he continued to work in Jakarta. Ann's three-bedroom house was on the grounds of the sultan's pleasure palace, a landscape of reflecting pools and gardens, ruins and towers, batik sellers and the old bird market. According to Maya, Lolo's aged mother had royal blood and lived with them in Yogyakarta. "She spoke fluent Dutch and Javanese," Maya recalled. "She was a tiny woman. She must have weighed, perhaps, ninety pounds and she birthed fourteen children. She chewed betel nut and spit into a silver spittoon. She was very much the lady, just like our Kansan grandmother, though they were worlds apart. She was very discreet. I would guess in Indonesia we would call it halus halus---sort of refined, very aware of her language." Dewey said that when Barry came to visit, Ann had to rent a house outside the pleasure palace grounds. The presence of one foreigner was an event; the presence of a teenager with no royal blood at all would have been "too much."

Ann's eventual separation from Lolo was undramatic and relatively free of rancor. After a long time apart, they were finally divorced in 1980. Ann never asked for or received regular alimony or child support, according to the divorce records.

Politically, Dunham was a "garden-variety Democrat," Dewey recalled, but her mind was inclined not so much toward politics as it was toward a kind of engaged service. She joked that she wanted equal pay but wouldn't stop shaving her legs. "She wasn't ideological "She wasn't ideological," Obama says. "I inherited that, I think, from her. She was suspicious of cant."

Mary Zurbuchen, who worked for the Ford Foundation, got to know Dunham when she was working at the foundation in the nineteen-eighties. Although Dunham was always trying to keep her dissertation moving forward, she earned her living, and made her greatest impact, as a development officer. "She was really concerned about women's rights and their livelihoods," Zurbuchen said. Women in Java were often central to the household economy but had no access to credit. Factory jobs were opening for young women, yet there was little talk about improving labor conditions. To raise issues of labor rights or human rights was risky, even for an established foundation like Ford. Dunham opened contact with labor activists. She helped start a consumers' rights organization. "It sounds anodyne now," Zurbuchen said, "but in those days a consumer organization raising questions about additives in food or the marketing of fake drugs--this was a cutting-edge civil-society activity.

"In the expat community, the things she was interested in and that Ford was pushing were not conventional," Zurbuchen went on. "The Indonesian government and the military pushed back. The economic interests, allied with the military, pushed back. If you worked on forestry, it wasn't long before you ran into the military-backed companies who were exploiting the forests. Ann faced pushback on labor-rights issues. She was also interested in family law and inheritance of property rights for women. Women who wanted to ban polygamy and to get their legal rights in the family were also her concern. There has been progress, but it came slowly."

Ann wrote to Alice Dewey in 1984 while she was working for the Ford Foundation and teaching at provincial colleges; back home, her son had graduated from Columbia and was writing business reports for a firm in New York. The letter is filled with details of her frenetic efforts on behalf of women all over Southeast Asia: Dearest Alice,Apa kabar? I hope this letter finds you and all the canine, feline and hominid members of your household doing well....Other than worrying about plans for fall, life is good here. Maybe you remember that I am handling projects for Ford in the areas of women, employment, and industry (small and large).... This year I have major projects for women on plantations in West Java and North Sumatra; for women in kretek factories in Central and East Java; for street-food sellers and scavengers in the cities of Jakarta, Jogja and Bandung; for women in credit cooperatives in East Java; for women in electronics factories, mainly in the Jakarta-Bogor area; for women in cottage industry cooperatives in the district of Klaten; for hand-loom weavers in West Timor; ... for street food sellers in Thailand (with Cristina Szanton as the project leader); etc. In addition I am still team-teaching the Sociology of the Family course with Pujiwati Sayogo at Bogor Agricultural Univ., and I am project specialist on a research project that she is coordinating on The Roles of Rural Women on the Outer Islands of Indonesia.... In April the Foundation is sending me to Bangla Desh for an employment conference. I am hoping to take Maya with me (in lieu of home leave this year) and stop off in Thailand on the way there and Delhi on the way back ...Maya is enjoying life as an 8th grader at the International School, and she seems to be turning into a people right on schedule. She hates me to brag, but I am forced to mention that she made high honors this term....Much love,Ann When Obama describes his mother as a singular influence, someone directed toward public service and the improvement of the lives of the poor but without an emphasis on ideology, this was the sort of work he is referring to. "He became the kind of person "He became the kind of person Ann was, the maverick who really wanted to bring change to the world," the Indonesian jounalist Julia Suryakusuma said. Ann was, the maverick who really wanted to bring change to the world," the Indonesian jounalist Julia Suryakusuma said.

Dunham may have been unable to help her son in all the ways that she had hoped or that he needed, but, in her own way, she did what she could. Obama remembers that even when he was very young she would give him books, record alb.u.ms, and tape recordings of the great voices of African-American history. Obama teased his mother, saying that she had been a pioneer in Afrocentric education. Similarly, Ann made sure that Maya learned Indonesian. Maya went on to study Javanese dance and got a Ph.D. in education; Alice Dewey was on her dissertation committee. Her husband, Konrad Ng, teaches media studies at the University of Hawaii and has written articles such as "Policing Cultural Traffic: Charlie Chan and Hawaii Detective Fiction."

Ann was able to do what her first husband could not. She was able to negotiate the distances between worlds and cultures and remain whole; the pa.s.sage enriched her even when it caused complications in her role as a mother to her son. Dunham might not have been the most conventional mother, but she cannot be faulted for stifling her son's ambitions. "I do remember Mom and I making jokes about, 'Oh yeah, you're going to be the first black President,'" Maya said. "I don't know why we would make those jokes. I can only a.s.sume it was because he was always right. He was one of those people who even as a young man was like an old man, you know?

"When he went to college," Maya continued, "I would have been nine, ten, eleven, twelve, and we would joke about this, but I think on the one hand we were teasing him, but behind the joke there was the sense that he was going to do something important. I always felt that way about him, and my mother felt pretty early on that he belonged to something bigger."

At Punahou, however, he was not the student-politician sort. Barry Obama was a basketball fanatic, the kid you saw walking down the street to school, to the grocery store, to visit friends, always dribbling a ball slick with wear. On weekends, he played full-court runs at Punahou. In the early mornings before cla.s.s and after school until dark, he played with schoolmates on the outdoor courts at Punahou. In Tony Peterson's yearbook, he wrote: Tony, man, I sure am glad I got to know you before you left. All those Ethnic Corner trips to the snack bar and playing ball made the year a lot more enjoyable, even though the snack bar trips cost me a fortune. Anyway, great knowing you and I hope we keep in touch. Good luck in everything you do, and get that law degree. Some day when I am a pro basketballer, and I want to sue my team for more money, I'll call you.

Barry made the junior varsity team in tenth grade and varsity the next year. The basketball court was a circ.u.mscribed area of life where Obama felt comfortable and, sometimes, where he encountered a world beyond Punahou. Some of the black soldiers on the island played on the courts near his building and Barry was happy not only to play with them but also to pick up on their language, their manners and style on the court--something that watching N.B.A. games on television did not provide. "He didn't know who he was "He didn't know who he was until he found basketball," his future brother-in-law Craig Robinson said. "It was the first time he really met black people." This was an exaggeration, but not by much. until he found basketball," his future brother-in-law Craig Robinson said. "It was the first time he really met black people." This was an exaggeration, but not by much.

On the varsity team, Barry played under Chris McLachlin, a locally celebrated coach with a sympathetic manner and a distinctly old-school approach to the game. McLachlin's emphasis on disciplined teamwork and stalwart defense did not encourage the flamboyance of Obama's hero, the Philadelphia 76ers star Julius Erving. McLachlin's teams were successful playing the sort of full-court, maximum-pressure defensive press that Dean Smith used at North Carolina and employing many of the disciplined offensive plays that John Wooden ran at U.C.L.A.

Obama hustled in practice, and he impressed his teammates with his fluidity and an odd, but effective, double-pump jump shot that he took in the lane off the dribble. He had skill and drive, but because the team was so packed with exceptional talent--three players on the starting five in his senior year went on to play serious college ball, and one forward, John Kamana, went on to a career in professional football--Obama did not get nearly as much playing time as he wanted. He groused about that to his friends, but he kept playing.

"Basketball was a good way for me to channel my energy," Obama said during the Presidential race. "It did parallel some of the broader struggles I was going through, because there were some issues in terms of racial ident.i.ty that played themselves out on the basketball court. You know, I had an overtly black game, behind-the-back pa.s.ses, and wasn't particularly concerned about fundamentals, whereas our coach was this Bobby Knight guy, and he was all about fundamentals--you know, bounce pa.s.ses, and four pa.s.ses before you shoot, and that sort of thing. So we had this little conflict that landed me on the bench when I argued. The truth was, on the playground, I could beat a lot of the guys who were starters, and I think he thought it was useful to have me there in practice." to channel my energy," Obama said during the Presidential race. "It did parallel some of the broader struggles I was going through, because there were some issues in terms of racial ident.i.ty that played themselves out on the basketball court. You know, I had an overtly black game, behind-the-back pa.s.ses, and wasn't particularly concerned about fundamentals, whereas our coach was this Bobby Knight guy, and he was all about fundamentals--you know, bounce pa.s.ses, and four pa.s.ses before you shoot, and that sort of thing. So we had this little conflict that landed me on the bench when I argued. The truth was, on the playground, I could beat a lot of the guys who were starters, and I think he thought it was useful to have me there in practice."

"We had our clash between his playground style and our very deliberate style," McLachlin said. "He argued for more playing time, even called a meeting for him and a couple of others. He respectfully lobbied for their cause, and rightfully so.... He would have started for anyone else in the state." In his senior year, Obama had a few good games and his grandfather was pleased to hear him complimented on the local radio broadcasts. "It was good to get a few props "It was good to get a few props late in life," Obama joked many years after. late in life," Obama joked many years after.

In Barry's senior year, Punahou overpowered Moa.n.a.lua High School, 60-28, to win the state championship. As he had all season, Obama played a secondary role. "It's never easy when you're young to realize you're never going to be the best at something you love," Larry Tavares said. "Barry had to realize he was going to have to look in other directions."

In 1999, Obama, writing an article for the an article for the Punahou Bulletin Punahou Bulletin in the avuncular mode of a successful alumnus, said, "By the time I moved back to Hawaii, and started school at Punahou, I had come to recognize that Hawaii was not immune to issues of race and cla.s.s, issues that manifested themselves in the poverty among so many native Hawaiian families, and the glaring differences between the facilities we at Punahou enjoyed and the crumbling public schools that so many of our peers were forced to endure. My budding awareness of life's unfairness made for a more turbulent adolescence than perhaps some of my cla.s.smates' experiences. As an African-American teenager in a school with few African-Americans, I probably questioned my ident.i.ty a bit harder than most. As a kid from a broken home and family of relatively modest means, I nursed more resentments than my circ.u.mstances justified, and didn't always channel those resentments in particularly constructive ways. in the avuncular mode of a successful alumnus, said, "By the time I moved back to Hawaii, and started school at Punahou, I had come to recognize that Hawaii was not immune to issues of race and cla.s.s, issues that manifested themselves in the poverty among so many native Hawaiian families, and the glaring differences between the facilities we at Punahou enjoyed and the crumbling public schools that so many of our peers were forced to endure. My budding awareness of life's unfairness made for a more turbulent adolescence than perhaps some of my cla.s.smates' experiences. As an African-American teenager in a school with few African-Americans, I probably questioned my ident.i.ty a bit harder than most. As a kid from a broken home and family of relatively modest means, I nursed more resentments than my circ.u.mstances justified, and didn't always channel those resentments in particularly constructive ways.

"And yet," he concluded optimistically, "when I look back on my years in Hawaii, I realize how truly lucky I was to have been raised there. Hawaii's spirit of tolerance might not have been perfect or complete, but it was--and is--real. The opportunity that Hawaii offered--to experience a variety of cultures in a climate of mutual respect--became an integral part of my world view, and a basis for the values that I hold most dear."

But, as the author of his own past, Obama cast a far harsher light on his Punahou years. In his memoir, he writes of occasional internal rages, of confusion, of the drugs that provided momentary escape. Exhausted in his Exhausted in his attempt to "untangle a mess that wasn't of [his] making"--the mess that was his non-relationship with his father--he stopped caring, or tried to. attempt to "untangle a mess that wasn't of [his] making"--the mess that was his non-relationship with his father--he stopped caring, or tried to. In what may be the most famous In what may be the most famous pa.s.sage in the book, Obama writes, "Pot had helped, and booze, maybe a little blow when you could afford it." When I interviewed Obama in 2006, he denied none of it and made no coy remarks about not inhaling or about being young and foolish. These were the dodges of his two predecessors--Clinton and Bush. Had he inhaled? pa.s.sage in the book, Obama writes, "Pot had helped, and booze, maybe a little blow when you could afford it." When I interviewed Obama in 2006, he denied none of it and made no coy remarks about not inhaling or about being young and foolish. These were the dodges of his two predecessors--Clinton and Bush. Had he inhaled?

"That was the point, wasn't it?" he said with a broad smile.

Indeed it was. "It was Hawaii in the seventies "It was Hawaii in the seventies--everywhere you looked there were posters of marijuana leaves," a cla.s.smate, Kelli Furushima, said. "It was kind of like the sixties were lingering on and so it was totally party, recreational. It wasn't some sort of deep, dark getaway from society. It was palm trees are swaying, blue skies, waves lapping on the ocean, just part of island life in paradise."

Obama did get high with some frequency, and he was not especially reluctant to advertise the fact. His yearbook, The Oahuan The Oahuan, includes not just a standard senior-year portrait of him in a seventies white leisure suit but also a still-life photograph of a beer bottle and Zig Zag rolling papers. In the caption, Obama wrote thanks to "Tut and Gramps" and the "Choom Gang." "Chooming," in Hawaiian slang, means smoking marijuana.

"I'm sure if my mother had had any clue what that was," Obama said, "she would not have been pleased." had had any clue what that was," Obama said, "she would not have been pleased."

In a letter from Indonesia, Ann tried to prod Barry during his senior year about his grades and college: "It is a shame we have to worry so much about [grade point average], but you know what the college entrance compet.i.tion is these days. Did you know that in Thomas Jefferson's day, and right up through the 1930s, anybody who had the price of tuition could go to Harvard? ... I don't see that we are producing many Thomas Jeffersons nowadays. Instead we are producing Richard Nixons." Obama had the capacity to be an A student, but his overall aimlessness, the partying, his lack of direction, held him back. Obama admits, "I probably Obama admits, "I probably could've been a better ball player and a better student if I hadn't been goofing off so much." Recalling not only the drugs he did take, but also the heroin that was offered to him (and rejected), Obama wonders, in a searching, self-dramatizing moment, if he hadn't been in danger of taking a far more desperate road than that of the typical high-school partier: could've been a better ball player and a better student if I hadn't been goofing off so much." Recalling not only the drugs he did take, but also the heroin that was offered to him (and rejected), Obama wonders, in a searching, self-dramatizing moment, if he hadn't been in danger of taking a far more desperate road than that of the typical high-school partier: Junkie. Pothead. That's where I'd been headed: the final, fatal role of the young would-be black man. Except the highs hadn't been about that, me trying to prove what a down brother I was. Not by then, anyway. I got high for just the opposite effect, something that could push questions of who I was out of my mind, something that could flatten out the landscape of my heart, blur the edges of my memory.

On one of her trips home during Obama's senior year, Ann Dunham heard about the drug arrest of one of Barry's friends and barged into his room wanting to know about it. She tried to express her concern about his declining grades, his lack of initiative in filling out college applications. Barry flashed his mother the sort of rea.s.suring smile that had been so effective in the past. Barry knew he was adrift. Rage, drugs, disaffection, racial fury--he trusted none of them. "At best, these things were a refuge "At best, these things were a refuge; at worst, a trap," he wrote. "Following this maddening logic, the only thing you could choose as your own was withdrawal into a smaller and smaller coil of rage, until being black meant only the knowledge of your own powerlessness, of your own defeat. And the final irony: Should you refuse this defeat and lash out at your captors, they would have a name for that, too, a name that could cage you just as good. Paranoid. Militant. Violent. n.i.g.g.e.r."

Barry was so so far far from "black America." The closest center of African-American life was Los Angeles, a five-hour flight away. One of the more thoughtful and consequential things Stanley Dunham did in his role as a surrogate father was to take his grandson to one of his African-American friends in the neighborhood known as the Jungle, in Waikiki. A kind of bohemian beach community of narrow lanes, cheap hotels, rooming houses, students, travelers, and surfer-b.u.ms, the Jungle was home to an aging poet, and journalist, named Frank Marshall Davis. from "black America." The closest center of African-American life was Los Angeles, a five-hour flight away. One of the more thoughtful and consequential things Stanley Dunham did in his role as a surrogate father was to take his grandson to one of his African-American friends in the neighborhood known as the Jungle, in Waikiki. A kind of bohemian beach community of narrow lanes, cheap hotels, rooming houses, students, travelers, and surfer-b.u.ms, the Jungle was home to an aging poet, and journalist, named Frank Marshall Davis.

Davis lived at the Koa Cottages on Kuhio Avenue. He wore an aloha shirt and cut-offs. People dropped in on him all the time to drink, maybe smoke a joint, talk, play Scrabble or bridge. His bungalow was like a non-stop salon: literary, political, and relaxed. Frank Davis was one of the more interesting men in Honolulu and Stanley Dunham was one of his regular visitors.

Like Stanley, Frank Marshall Davis was from Kansas. He grew up in Arkansas City, "a yawn town," he called it, fifty miles south of Wichita. was from Kansas. He grew up in Arkansas City, "a yawn town," he called it, fifty miles south of Wichita. In his memoir, In his memoir, Livin' the Blues Livin' the Blues, Davis writes, "Like virtually all Afro-Americans--and a high percentage of whites--I am ethnic hash"--African mainly, an eighth Mexican, and "I have no idea what." Frank's Kansas was not much like Stanley's--his was a land of lynchings and frontier racism--but they became friends. Frank Davis was a raconteur, capable of expounding on everything from the Harlem Renaissance to the various charms of the surfer girls in Waikiki. He spoke in a fantastically deep Barry White voice and he tended to dominate the discussion, telling stories for hours about his grandmother, who had been a slave; the indignities of being black in Arkansas City, including nearly being lynched when he was five years old; his distinguished career as a columnist and editor in the world of the black press in Chicago, Gary, and Atlanta; his friendships with Richard Wright and Paul Robeson. In the nineteen-thirties and forties, Davis wrote four collections of poems about black life--Black Man's Verse, I Am the American Negro, Through Sepia Eyes, and 47th Street 47th Street--and won the praise of distinguished critics like Alain Locke, who believed that Davis would help fulfill the promise of a New Negro Renaissance in poetry.

In 1948, Paul Robeson came to Hawaii on a concert tour sponsored by the International Longsh.o.r.e and Warehouse Union, a left-wing union. Robeson was so enamored of the atmosphere on the islands that he told reporters, "It would be a tremendous impact on the United States if Hawaii is admitted as a state. Americans wouldn't believe the racial harmony that exists here. It could speed democracy in the United States." In 1946, Davis had married a much younger woman, a white Chicago socialite named Helen Canfield. Robeson extolled Hawaii to such a degree that Helen read more about the islands, and she and Frank Davis decided to move for a while to Honolulu, thinking that they would stay for the winter. They divorced in 1970, but Davis never left. on a concert tour sponsored by the International Longsh.o.r.e and Warehouse Union, a left-wing union. Robeson was so enamored of the atmosphere on the islands that he told reporters, "It would be a tremendous impact on the United States if Hawaii is admitted as a state. Americans wouldn't believe the racial harmony that exists here. It could speed democracy in the United States." In 1946, Davis had married a much younger woman, a white Chicago socialite named Helen Canfield. Robeson extolled Hawaii to such a degree that Helen read more about the islands, and she and Frank Davis decided to move for a while to Honolulu, thinking that they would stay for the winter. They divorced in 1970, but Davis never left. "I am not too fond "I am not too fond of what I read about the current mainland scene, so I prefer staying here," Davis told the newspaper of what I read about the current mainland scene, so I prefer staying here," Davis told the newspaper Black World Black World in 1974. "Since we do not have the confrontations that exist between white and Black in so many parts of the mainland, living here has been a relief." in 1974. "Since we do not have the confrontations that exist between white and Black in so many parts of the mainland, living here has been a relief."

In Honolulu, Davis ran a paper company, but that soon burned to the ground. He also worked with the I.L.W.U. and wrote for its weekly newspaper, the Honolulu Record Record, which lasted from 1948 to 1958. Some of his "fellow freedom fighters" Some of his "fellow freedom fighters" back in Chicago accused him of "deserting the battle," he wrote, but in Hawaii he was less angry than he had been on the mainland, more at ease, though he never gave up his political views. He wrote fierce columns about the suppression of unions, conditions on the plantations, the power of the oligarchic Hawaiian families, race relations. He was one of many leftists who, in the nineteen-fifties, were investigated, and tainted, by the House Un-American Activities Committee. In Hawaii he could put many thousands of miles between himself and his would-be tormentors. back in Chicago accused him of "deserting the battle," he wrote, but in Hawaii he was less angry than he had been on the mainland, more at ease, though he never gave up his political views. He wrote fierce columns about the suppression of unions, conditions on the plantations, the power of the oligarchic Hawaiian families, race relations. He was one of many leftists who, in the nineteen-fifties, were investigated, and tainted, by the House Un-American Activities Committee. In Hawaii he could put many thousands of miles between himself and his would-be tormentors.

"Virtually from the start I had a sense of human dignity," Davis writes in I had a sense of human dignity," Davis writes in Livin' the Blues Livin' the Blues. "On the mainland, whites acted as if dignity were their exclusive possession, something to be awarded only as they saw fit. Yet dignity is a human right, earned by being born. In Hawaii I had at last come into ownership of this birthright, stolen by the white power structure as a penalty of being black. Even on the Chicago South Side, where I was but another drop in a black pool, I was painfully conscious we had been baled, like cotton, into this area because whitey so decreed. It was a relief to soar at last with no wings clipped by the scissors of color." Davis was well aware that "under the placid surface of aloha was an undertow of racism," and he knew that he had given up the pleasures of the South Side. "Hawaii is not for those who can be happy only in Soul City," he warned. "This is no place for those who can identify only with Afro-America. 'Little Harlem' is only a couple of blocks of bars, barbershops, and a soul food restaurant or two."

Dawna Weatherly-Williams, a close friend who lived next door--she called Frank Davis "Daddy"--remembers that Stanley Dunham came by to visit with his grandson sometime in the early nineteen-seventies. "Daddy had his feet propped up and he saw them and called out, 'Hey, Stan! Oh, is this him?'" she recalled. "Stan had been promising to bring Barry by because we all had that in common--Frank's kids were half white, Stan's grandson was half black and my son was half black. Barry was well dressed, in a blazer, I think. He was tired and he was hungry. He had a full face--it wasn't pointed like it is now. We were all grinning like idiots, me and Frank and Stan, because we were thinking that we know this secret about life and we were going to share it with Barry. He hadn't seen anyone that looked like him before.

"Frank was also a great listener, which may be why Barack liked him, too. I am sure he influenced Barack more than Barack is saying. About social justice, about finding out more about life, about what's important, about how to use your heart and your mind. It's probably good that it wasn't a big thing, that he didn't make too big a thing of it all, because he was way ahead of his time."

As a teenager, Obama called on Davis on his own, driving along the Ala Wai Ca.n.a.l to the Jungle. One night, Frank gave him some insight into Stanley, telling him a story about how many years before the Dunhams had hired a young black woman to help care for Ann.

"A preacher's daughter, I think it was. Told me how she became a regular part of the family."

A regular part of the family--the language that earnest middle-cla.s.s white people use to soothe their guilt about hiring blacks to clean their houses, to be nannies for their children.

Barry had told Frank about his grandmother's anxiety at encountering a scary-seeming black man on the street. Everything about the incident was confusing--his grandmother's fears, Stanley's shame--but Frank, who considered himself friends with the family, seemed to understand it all. He explained that even the most sympathetic white people could never fully comprehend a black man's pain. ("He's basically a good man. But he doesn't know know me. Any more than he knew that girl that looked after your mother. He me. Any more than he knew that girl that looked after your mother. He can't can't know me, not the way I know him.") Why was it, after all, that Stanley could visit, drink Frank's whiskey, fall asleep in his chair, and yet Frank couldn't do the same in his house? know me, not the way I know him.") Why was it, after all, that Stanley could visit, drink Frank's whiskey, fall asleep in his chair, and yet Frank couldn't do the same in his house?

"What I'm trying to tell you is," Frank Davis said, "your grandma's right to be scared. She's at least as right as Stanley is. She understands that black people have a reason to hate. That's just how it is. For your sake, I wish it were otherwise. But it's not. So you might as well get used to it."

When Obama was running for President, the right-wing blogosphere attacked Frank Marshall Davis. He was, by turns, a card-carrying Communist, a p.o.r.nographer, a pernicious influence. The attacks were loud and unrelenting. For them, an acquaintanceship with Frank Marshall Davis was all part of an ominous picture of radical a.s.sociations. And yet, while that relationship was neither constant nor lasting, certainly of no great ideological importance, Davis, by Obama's own accounting, made the young man feel something deep and disorienting. That night in the Jungle in Waikiki, he felt completely alone. To make some sense of himself, he would have to leave Hawaii for another country.

Chapter Three.

n.o.body Knows My Name Obama's academic performance at Punahou was unremarkable, but even though he was a B-student his college prospects were promising. Like the best New England prep schools, Punahou routinely sent its top-tier students to the best colleges and universities in the country--and the second-tier students, Obama included, did almost as well. Along with most of his cla.s.smates, Obama had developed a case of "rock fever." He was eager to get off the island. From a girl he met in Hawaii, he heard about Occidental, a small, highly regarded school of about sixteen hundred undergraduates in Eagle Rock, California, near Pasadena. Accepted at several colleges, Obama took a flyer: he chose Occidental. at Punahou was unremarkable, but even though he was a B-student his college prospects were promising. Like the best New England prep schools, Punahou routinely sent its top-tier students to the best colleges and universities in the country--and the second-tier students, Obama included, did almost as well. Along with most of his cla.s.smates, Obama had developed a case of "rock fever." He was eager to get off the island. From a girl he met in Hawaii, he heard about Occidental, a small, highly regarded school of about sixteen hundred undergraduates in Eagle Rock, California, near Pasadena. Accepted at several colleges, Obama took a flyer: he chose Occidental.

Obama writes that just before leaving for the mainland and his freshman year, he paid a last visit to Frank Marshall Davis. As he always did, the old man welcomed Obama warmly--and then challenged him. Rattling Obama was his way of giving counsel. He had told Obama that black kids lucky enough to go to college invariably emerge into the world with "an advanced degree in compromise." Now he was telling Obama that no one was telling him the truth about "the real price of admission" to college.

And what was that? Obama asked.

"Leaving your race at the door," Davis said. "Leaving your people behind."

A place like Occidental wouldn't give Obama a real education, Davis insisted, so much as "train" him. "They'll train you so good, you'll start believing what they tell you about equal opportunity and the American way and all that s.h.i.t. They'll give you a corner office and invite you to fancy dinners, and tell you you're a credit to your race. Until you want to actually start running things, and then they'll yank on your chain and let you know that you may be a well-trained, well-paid n.i.g.g.e.r, but you're a n.i.g.g.e.r just the same." Go to college, Davis said, but "keep your eyes open."

Obama thought of Davis much the way he thought of his mother--as a product of his time. And yet he couldn't dismiss him. Even before Obama joined the swim of African-American life, he had been warned about the perils of selling out, of tokenism and the limits of white tolerance. Obama soon discovered that the political and internal wariness that Davis prescribed was not so easy to uphold at Occidental. With Spanish Revival architecture and unfailing weather, Occidental was a favorite of Hollywood; in films from the Marx Brothers to "Clueless," Occidental was the generic California campus. The college was surrounded by a working-cla.s.s Hispanic neighborhood, but students seldom got much beyond campus; when they did, it was usually to go roller-skating on the boardwalk at Venice Beach, body-surfing at Newport Beach, or to a concert downtown. Everyone knew everyone. "Oxy is like Peyton Place, it's so small," Obama's cla.s.smate and friend Phil Boerner said.

In September, 1979, Obama moved into a single-room triple in a dormitory known as Haines Hall Annex. He shared Room A104 with a Pakistani named Imad Husain, who is now a banker in Boston, and Paul Carpenter, now a mortgage banker in Los Angeles. His roommates and dorm mates were friendly and inviting. The hallway was unusually diverse for Occidental: there were African-Americans, Asians, Hispanics, Arabs. Occidental draws heavily on middle-and upper-middle-cla.s.s kids from California, but Obama seemed at ease. Although he was getting financial aid, no on