The Latest: Obama finishes playing golf with 3 friends | AP News While Obama's prom photographs have never been seen before, details have previously emerged about his high school years. He was a younger black man looking for guidance." Last year, a book delved into his teenage years and claimed that Obama and his friends formed The Choom Gang - slang for smoking marijuana - in which he invented inhaling techniques and rode a car called the Choomwagon. I guarantee he would have won a third term if he could have run again. "There's no doubt that Keith's story is tragic and sad," Burton added. Made a strong case for them.. Its good for me, pre-Alzheimers, to try and remember this stuff, he said, struggling to recall something other than Obamas love for basketball and his improbable hook shot. The annual gatherings perhaps speak to Mr. Obamas greater need for their connection now that he has what is called the loneliest job in the world. He was the only foreign child in the neighborhood. So far, the candidacy of the man known by his high school friends as Barry Obama has been good for the Hawaii economy and bad for newsroom budgets. They're not his wife and daughters, who came with him, but a trio of pals whose friendship dates back to Obama's high school days in Hawaii. He'd pick them up if they fell down,'' Darmawan recalled. He sketched decidedly American cartoon characters during class. He would carry his books in one hand and his ball in the other," he said. "He never verbalized any of that," Orme said during a telephone interview from his home in Oregon. They got back in touch when she visited New York in 1982, before continuing a long-distance relationship that eventually fizzled out, according to his biographer David Maraniss. And from the first day of 5th grade right up until his graduation in 1979, the young man was one of only a small number of black students at a school heavily populated by the children of Hawaii's wealthy, most of them white and Asian. He was always very focused.. The president was returning to the White House on Monday. Hes not like that.. I brood, Mr. Obamas friend Mr. Ramos said a few years ago. The not-so-simple story of Barack Obama's youth (Photo by Joaquin Siopack-Pool/Getty Images) "He lived across the street from school and before classes hed shoot baskets on the outside courts, then at lunch hed shoot more baskets, then Id have him for three hours, then hed go home, eat supper, and then be outside again shooting baskets.. Millions of American teenagers will go to proms this year. The real Ray, Keith Kakugawa, is half black and half Japanese. But we didnt really become good friends until the seventh grade. 'When you're president, everybody wants something from you and only these types of friends are able to simply want your well-being. Sheriff: Cleveland man shot after attacking man with hatchet at Morgan County campground Our second string should be playing more.'" He remembers one day when young Obama, a hopelessly upbeat boy who seemed oblivious to the fact that the older kids didn't want him tagging along, followed a group of Adi's friends to a nearby swamp. College would be his next stop. Once again, Stanley and Madelyn Dunham, who had been as much parents as grandparents throughout the young man's life, said he could live with them. Obama, his mother and new baby sister, Maya, moved into a small apartment near the school's sprawling, lush campus. And once you started playing well, contributing on the court, pretty much the racial aspect goes away.. His love for Michelle and Sasha and Malia is outstanding. Obama and his date Megan Hughes, a student at the Hawaii School for Girls at La Pietra, joined Orme at Allmans house, where the two couples sipped champagne before going to the dance and then an after-party. In April 2011, Mr. Titcomb was arrested on a charge of soliciting prostitution in a Honolulu sting operation, but the reunions with the president never stopped. Yet many say they have trouble reconciling their nearly 30-year-old memories with Obamas more recent descriptions of himself as a brooding and sometimes angry adolescent, grappling with his mixed race and the void left by a father who gave him his black skin but little else. Their new neighborhood was only 3 miles to the west, but a world away. We are no longer accepting comments on this article. You gotta give him that.. One day while visiting his mother, who was working at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, Obama passed time by looking through several issues of Life magazine. Their. The reality was less tidy. On Sunday evening, Titcomb hosted a barbecue at his beachfront home for the entire contingent from . Elite Dutch colonists once lived there; the Japanese moved in during their occupation of Indonesia in World War II. Dan Hale, the 6-foot-7-inch star center of the 1979 Punahou basketball team, said Obamas depiction of Hawaii as a place where race really mattered hardly resonates with him. The foursome, according to the Associated Press, teed off with another eight players. In the early 1970s, diplomats and Indonesian businessmen lived there in fancy gated houses with wide paved roads and sculpted bushes. In Hawaii, Media Surfs Obama's Past - POLITICO IE 11 is not supported. You really deserve better than clowns like us; you even laugh at my jokes!. The three men - Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme - are among the few people still in Obama's life who knew him long before he was famous. The experience of being part of a winning team was important to Barry, to all of us.. Im incredibly proud of my friend. The 1979 photo was snapped inside the home of former classmate, Kelli Allman, who was the prom date of the pr, Fashion alert! "But he wanted to remain at Punahou. He recently played golf with his boyhood friend on a return to Hawaii, and the president also invited him to his 49th birthday party in. He would bring up worldly topics far beyond his years. Now, I think hes a better golfer., Orme and Obama became pals not long after the future president arrived at Punahou as a fifth grader. Obama's high school yearbook note to his best friend's girlfriend They only did it to Barry." But it has revealed the vagaries of memory, as well as the ambivalent emotions stirred among old acquaintances when someone they once knew becomes famous. Obama and his. Teachers, former playmates and friends recall a boy who never fully grasped their language and who was very quiet as a result. News. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Greg? I don't see that we are producing many Thomas Jeffersons nowadays. ___ 10:40 a.m. Visits With School Pals Are a Touchstone on President's Trips to Hawaii The Obamas did skip Hawaii in 2007 and instead the friends joined Mr. Obama in wintry Iowa for the January 2008 presidential caucuses. Allman said the two couples sipped Champagne before going to the dance, and then an after-party. When asked about the discrepancy, Obama said in a recent interview, "It might have been an Ebony or it might have been who knows what it was?" You had three part-Hawaiians, one Filipino and me., But Hale said he is still enjoying the novelty of a famous classmate. Cook, who was 25, and Obama, then 22, dated for 18 months, passing their time discussing books and cooking. The pretty blonde on the right was the future president's prom date. Not many presidents retained friendships from as far back as high school, although George W. Bush had close friends from his prep school days at Andover. This is my man! a delighted Obama said, Maurer recalled. The comments below have not been moderated, By 2023 TIME USA, LLC. Topolinski said neither he nor Obama were stars on their high school team. And he frequently made peace--even allies--with the very people who angered him most. The first family has attended Titcomb's annual luaus in the past. Among his supporters, his likability and credibility have only been boosted by his stories of being an outsider trying to fight his way in. He even scored a basket," he said. FILE - In this Dec. 29, 2014 file photo, President Barack Obama, center, walks during a round of golf with Greg Orme, left, and Mike Ramos, on the 18th hole of the Mid Pacific Country Club in . All four were classmates at Punahou School in Honolulu, which Obama has described as 'a prestigious prep school, an incubator for island elites. All say he was teased more than any other kid in the neighborhood--primarily because he was bigger and had black features. The reality was less tidy. Yet even Obama has acknowledged the limits of memoir. "He'd go right up to the coach during a game and say, `Coach, we're killing this team. In August, Obama kicked off his 53rd birthday weekend golfing with the three friends in suburban Maryland before heading to Camp David, the presidential retreat in the Catoctin Mountains. Darin Maurer and then-presidential candidate Barack Obama. (At the request of the Tribune, archivists at Ebony searched their catalogue of past articles, none of which matched what Obama recalled.) The White House says Obama is playing golf with some of his longtime friends including Mike Ramos, Greg Orme and Bobby Titcomb. While Obama rocketed to political prominence, his friend headed down the troubled road Obama had feared he was following. From left: Greg Orme, Kelli Allman, Barack Obama and Megan Hughes at Allmans parents house in Honolulu. Speaking up for yourself., I gave them more playing time, McLachlin chuckled. "I never knew, until reading the book later, how much that night had upset him." We have this tradition to head home to Hawaii for Christmas. It can be very racially hostile, especially if youre white or black. He had friends there, he was comfortable there, and to a kid his age, that's all that mattered." President-elect Barack Obama and friend Greg Orme wait to warm up on the driving range to play golf with friends December 29, 2008 in Kailua, Hawaii.. President-elect Barack Obama hugs friend Greg Orme before a round of golf December 29, 2008 at the Mid Pacific Country Club in Kailua, Hawaii. The article included photos of a black man who had destroyed his skin with powerful chemical lighteners that promised to make him white. But its fun to imagine that in one of those pictures, theres a girl in a pastel dress or a lanky guy in a white sport coat who will end up becoming the leader of the free world. They marked the 10th year of their rendezvous by looking through old photos, Mr. Ramos said, of when the kids were young and the dads had dark hair. And of course, he said, they all the president included reflected on the past year. In fact, the Life article and the photographs don't exist, say the magazine's own historians. His spelling wasnt too good either, he said, referring to the note Obama wrote in his high school year book. When his mother, a woman said to have been born with a keen sense of wanderlust, announced she was returning to Indonesia, Obama, then a teenager, asked to stay in Hawaii, according to Soetoro-Ng, 36, who still lives in Honolulu. But spokesman Bill Burton said Obama "stands by his recollections of these events as related in his book." But those talks, Kakugawa said, were not about race. The Latest: Obamas, friends tour Hawaii Islamic arts center They agreed to rendezvous in Hawaii every year for the holidays, and their reunions became regular even as Mr. Obama was busy climbing to senator and president, a path none of them imagined nearly four decades ago and 5,000 miles from Washington. HONOLULU -- Until recently, the players on Hawaiis 1979 state basketball championship team thought their glory days were behind them, consigned to yearbooks and faded newspaper clippings. Thats when we see each other. He also was one of the only neighborhood children whose parents enrolled him in a new Catholic school in an area populated almost entirely by Betawis, the old tribal landowning Jakarta natives who were very traditional Muslims. Barack Obama as a sophomore with the junior varsity basketball team at Punahou School, Honolulu, in 1977. Barack Obama as a baby. Or Hawaiian. Hail to the chief's pals: Obama spending vacation relaxing with three Mr. Titcomb was golfing with the president within hours of the Obamas Dec. 21 arrival on Oahu. Since 1995, Kakugawa has spent more than 7 years in California prisons and months in Los Angeles County Jail on cocaine and auto theft charges. Bendix added that he was not shocked when Obama was elected president. From his earliest moments on the national political stage, Obama has presented himself as having two unique qualifications: a fresh political face and an ability to bridge the gap between Americans of different races, faiths and circumstances. He knew that." Many of the men were black. The Hawaii holidays became more and more appealing, he said in an interview just after he began his run for president. I cant tell if someone is Fijian or black.. Vanity Fair is coming soon. Pic of the day: Barack Obama at prom | Salon.com After high school graduation Obama went to Columbia University and then Harvard Law School, where he met his future wife, Michelle. According to the book, the characters representing Orme and the other friend asked to leave the party after just an hour, saying they felt out of place. Obama wrote in the lengthy yearbook note. Pothead. Only Mr. Titcomb stayed in Hawaii. His character, the way he conducts himself, thats always been his footprint. But twice that year the group gathered in Hawaii in August before the Democratic National Convention and in December after Mr. Obamas election. Half the homes were old bamboo huts; half, including the Soetoro house, were nicer, with brick or concrete and red-tiled roofs. "We live in a world of bullies and the U.S. has been bullied around. "He didn't say what country he wanted to be president of. The three men - Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg. Because hes a pastor, Maurer said he prefers not to weigh-in on politics. Obama's High School Basketball Coaches, Teammates Remember 'Barry' Secret Service stops man flying drone near president's motorcade Bailey, who owes his nickname to his quickness on a court, said he's been "impressed by the way Obama handled himself as president." We have had presidents who have not modeled that super well., We had a long basketball career together, Orme recalled in a telephone interview from his home in Eugene, Oregon. With a trimmed Afro, Hawaiian flower leis around his neck, Obama was surrounded by the disparate people who shaped him. That thoughtful poet is not remembered by any of his basketball buddies, coaches or friends. Back then, Punahou was a completely open campus, with several basketball courts where 20-something men from Honolulu would come in the late afternoon for what often turned into flashy, highly competitive pickup sessions. The perfect tummy control bodysuit, a popcorn gadget, more bestsellers starting at $8. Although the Choom Gang has come to define Mr. Obamas high school circle owing partly to the presidents memoir, Dreams From My Father, and a notation that Mr. Obama made in his senior yearbook thanking the group for good times Mr. Ramos said in an interview after leaving Oahu this week that the phrase does not describe their circle. A spokeswoman for People said the reporter, West Coast correspondent Maureen Harrington, did not take the list. Allman said that she thought highly of Obama, who was 'very intelligent and witty'. Barry was a very confident player who liked to drive to the basket. At the same time, several of his oft-recited stories may not have happened in the way he has recounted them. He was tenacious.. I would go out there and be the only white person. Cook wrote that she saw his perfect woman as 'very strong, very upright, a fighter, a laugher, experienced - a black woman I keep seeing her as'. "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? Associated Press For a reputed loner, Mr. Obama has remained remarkably close to a trio he met as a teenager at Honolulus prestigious Punahou School boys of Hawaiis year-round summer with whom he played basketball, bodysurfed, drank beer and, like so many other young islanders in the 1970s, smoked pot, the choom of that long-ago nickname. Obamas family is already insulating itself. Obama and his family have . But generally, said the presidential biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin, It does seem like these presidents need to find a sanctuary whether its a place or a group of people where they can just be themselves and feel the connection from the present to the past. High school friends who predate adulthood and professional attainments often know each others siblings, parents, even grandparents and know each other in a way that later friends often cannot. And like Obama, he found his place on the basketball court. In the six weeks since Obama announced his intention to run for the White House, he routinely has suggested that his diverse background--raised for a time in the Third World, schooled at elite institutions and active in urban politics--makes him the best-suited candidate to speak to rich and poor, black and white, mainstream voters and those utterly disenchanted with the political system. The President of the United States is no different. This is the Barry I remember.. Left: Kelli Allmans OAHUAN 1979 Yearbook. In it, he wrote, was an article and two accompanying photographs of an African-American man physically and mentally scarred by his efforts to lighten his skin. And on Tuesday, in what's become a yearly tradition, the men and their families gathered for a luau hosted by Titcomb. Obama, however, was not a part of that group, according to Anthony and Smith. There are, however, chapters in Obamas high school narrative that are not subject to dispute. Obama also made golf outings,. Obama's Final Hawaiian Vacation as President - ABC News "They were like brothers," says Allman. He posed in lifeguard stands. They have a different level of affection for you than friends you meet later in life. The Latest: Obamas, friends tour Hawaii Islamic arts center But Furushima, too, is learning to be on guard around the press. He was probably studying them and learning from them. But Kakugawa, in the interview Saturday, said Obama's recollection of that conversation was mistaken. Bendix said he and Obama stayed in touch and he was at his 2008 inauguration. , updated So far, it has been a narrative spun almost entirely on Obamas terms and in his own words -- most prominently in his bestselling memoir, Dreams From My Father.. Hes off the grid, said Hale, who is now the schools head basketball coach. Because of his biracial heritage, he said, he was "like everyone in Hawaii, a mix of a lot of things." Murdaugh is heckled as he leaves court, Missing hiker buried under snow forces arm out to wave to helicopter, Incredible footage of Ukrainian soldiers fighting Russians in Bakhmut, Fleet-footed cop chases an offender riding a scooter, Two Russian tanks annihilated with bombs by Ukrainian armed forces, Isabel Oakeshott clashes with Nick Robinson over Hancock texts, Dozens stuck in car park as staff refuses to open gate for woman, Insane moment river of rocks falls onto Malibu Canyon in CA. When a friend gave him shrimp paste instead of chocolate, he yelled, "Curang, curang!" These have been the stories told about the first two character-shaping decades of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's life, a story line largely shaped by his own best-selling memoir, political speeches and interviews. In another passage from the book, Ray complains that white Punahou girls don't want to date black guys and that he and Obama don't get enough playing time as athletes, speculating that they'd be "treated different if we was white. ', In his memoir, 'Dreams From My Father,' Obama recalled a high school career that was, for the most part, ordinary 'marginal report cards and calls to the principal's office; part-time jobs at the burger chain; acne and driving tests and turbulent desire. He describes making friends easily, becoming fluent in Indonesian in just six months and melding quite easily into the very foreign fabric of Jakarta. Yearbook note Obama left for classmate Tom Topolinski when they graduated in 1979 from the Punahou school. Obama hangs with high school buds during Hawaii vacation Topolinski, who now lives in Washington state, said he lost touch with Obama after high school and they moved into different political camps. 'You really deserve better than clowns like us; you even laugh at my jokes! "But it could be a lonely place. After a recent lunch with a reporter, he winked at a table of faculty-lounge colleagues and joked, This one is with Playgirl.. "Barry liked to draw heroes." Wed drive around in my van listening to Earth, Wind & Fire and looking for places to play, he said. The photos and interviews are in the new issue of TIME, which is out on Friday. Murdaugh is heckled as he leaves court, Two Russian tanks annihilated with bombs by Ukrainian armed forces, Ukraine soldiers shoot down enemy drones with drones of their own, Dozens stuck in car park as staff refuses to open gate for woman, Missing hiker buried under snow forces arm out to wave to helicopter, Insane moment river of rocks falls onto Malibu Canyon in CA, Fleet-footed cop chases an offender riding a scooter, Isabel Oakeshott clashes with Nick Robinson over Hancock texts. Then, one day about a year after he had arrived, Obama was gone. "We were champions and I think it helped him become the man he is today. The president turns 53 on Monday. "And we were told he had already moved away." The White House says Obama teed off Saturday at the nine-hole course at the Sunnylands retreat in Rancho Mirage with childhood friends Bobby Titcomb, Greg Orme and Michael Ramos. Genevieve Cook, an elementary school teacher, and Obama met at a Christmas party in the East Village in 1983. Alan Lum, who later would coach the basketball team at Punahou as well as teach elementary school there, recalled Obama as always being the first to confront coaches when he felt they were not fairly allotting playing time. But, said Mr. Ramos, who is in the process of a divorce, We probably spent more time talking about my situation than we did about his., Visits With School Pals Are a Touchstone on Presidents Trips to Hawaii, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/04/us/politics/visits-with-school-pals-are-a-touchstone-on-presidents-trips-to-hawaii.html, opposite sides of the debate over crime and policing, prohibiting the use of the gender-neutral term in government documents, an array of forces has bolstered this groups presence in Congress and state legislatures. And a young, iconoclastic white woman who had defied the social mores of the day by marrying a dashing black man from Kenya was coping with the fact that her new husband essentially had abandoned her and their young child in 1963 to study at Harvard. Titcomb, who golfed another two days with Obama this month before the others got into town, was a year behind Obama at Punahou. On page 271 of the 1979 Oahuan, Obama's entry reflects the crossroads he found himself at as he prepared for life beyond Hawaii. Barry did a good job but I think we needed a change," he said. In fact, it is surprising, based on interviews with more than two dozen people who knew Obama during his nearly four years in Indonesia, that it would take a photograph in a magazine to make him conscious of the fact that some people might treat him differently in part because of the color of his skin. He came across an article that he later would describe as feeling like an "ambush attack." Throughout his youth, as depicted in his first book, he always found ways to meld into even the most uninviting of communities. Barry spent his days at the Punahou School in Hawaii studying, shooting hoops and goofing off with his friends. "It just wasn't a race thing," he reiterated again and again. The night, Obama later wrote, made him furious as he realized that whites held a "fundamental power" over blacks. I hadnt seen him for 30 years.. Now that life story is being edited by others. HONOLULU (AP) The Latest on President Barack Obama's annual two-week vacation in Hawaii (all times local): 4 p.m. The motorcade arrived in Kapolei around 11:30 a.m. ___ In his best-selling autobiography, "Dreams from My Father," Obama describes having heated conversations about racism with another black student, "Ray." In the second term, presidents have often sought refuge from the pressure by disappearing into nature to fish or hunt, said Douglas Brinkley, a presidential historian at Rice University. As Obama's senior year drew to a close, his mother sent him letters from afar, about life in Indonesia and her work there with non-profit groups doing economic development. He was a good player inside and out, Orme recalled. I hope we can keep in touch this summer, even though Greg will be gone.'. He has ethnic Chinese mother and his father was Polish. Barack Obama, Bobby Titcomb, Greg Orme - Zimbio As he had at the old school, Obama sat in a back corner. Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy. And he would be going to the gym to work on his strength and conditioning.. When youre on a school team, theres more discipline involved, he said. We have so many tones of brown here. A close friend of Obama's from their teenage years, Greg Orme, spent so much time with Dunham that he, too, called him "Gramps." For the past two weeks, he has been recharging on Oahu after an unpleasant year in the job. They were like brothers, says Allman. He attended a college basketball game with the first family the next day, and this week he and his wife hosted their annual barbecue for the other families, including those of the Obamas Chicago friends Eric Whitaker and Marty Nesbitt. After graduating in 1979, Maurer wound up at Stanford where he made the team as a walk on and found God. A high school friend has shared photographs of Obama at his prom night withTIME magazine - as well as a very friendly note he penned in her yearbook, in which he calls her 'sweet and foxy'. Once parked, they 'turned up their stereos playing Aerosmith, Blue Oyster Cult and Stevie Wonder, lit up some sweet-sticky Hawaiian buds and washed it down with green bottled beer (the Choom Gang preferred Heineken, Becks, and St. Pauli Girl).'. Of course, Obama embraced the image of the athlete, dribbling a ball to school and between classes. Obama and his Punahou School classmates Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme enjoyed a sunny and breezy day on the links. Obama wasn't shy about advocating for himself and his fellow backup players, Lum said. He played on the beach. I am in poor health.. TIME Exclusive: President Obamas 1979 Prom Photos. It remains a refuge for me when I travel there during the winter, my family and I, and see friends from high school.. Obamas prom pictures released. I know that was hard for him.". 'But the rest of it has sharp edges, 'Tho he speaks sweet words and can be open and trusting, there is also that coolness - and I begin to have an inkling of some things about him that could get to me.'. "He was very intelligent and witty. A boy wants to find his place in a family where he is visibly different: chubby where others are thin, dark where others are light. The Los Angeles Times weighed in the other day. Obama is spending the weekend golfing with Punahou School friends Greg Orme, Bobby Titcomb and Mike Ramos ahead of a summit of Southeast Asian leaders at the Sunnylands estate in Rancho. All three live mostly private lives when they're not being photographed with the commander in chief. But Obama never gave up and his work ethic was second to none on this team. Still, Bendix said, his old pal should have been a starter at Punahou and insisted he was not just being loyal to an old friend. "He liked drawing Spider-Man and Batman," said another friend, Widiyanto Hendro Cahyono, 46. "If this story is eight paragraphs, seven of them go to Greg.