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. Those are qualities a president should have. We played a lot of playground ball.. But those talks, Kakugawa said, were not about race. The fun may wear off, if history is any guide. IE 11 is not supported. 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. The Obamas attended a luau on Oahu's North Shore at the home of the president's childhood friend Bobby Titcomb, spending more than six hours at the gathering. After years during which the friends grew apart, Mr. Obama reconnected with Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg Orme a decade ago. With Obama just days away from turning over the reins to Donald Trump, Coach Mac and some of the guys young Barry played ball with at their Honolulu prep school reflected on his presidency and their playing years with pride. His character, the way he conducts himself, thats always been his footprint. The three men - Mike Ramos (right), Bobby Titcomb (not pictured) and Greg Orme (left) - are among the few people still in Obama's life who knew him long before he was famous. The reality was less tidy. As he had at the old school, Obama sat in a back corner. And while they did enjoy marijuana, Mr. Ramos acknowledged, we played a lot more basketball than we smoked pot.. Obama wrote in the lengthy yearbook note. Obama recounts taking two white friends, including Orme, to a party attended almost entirely by African-Americans. "He had a pretty good shot and really handled the ball well.. 2023 TIME USA, LLC. I know that was hard for him.". On his senior yearbook page, he left behind these words: We go play hoop.. We all come from so many backgrounds, we have to get along., Obamas teammates for the most part are careful not to judge an old friend, even if his memories of racial attitudes at Punahou differ from their own. Bailey, who coached Obama during his junior year and now runs an ambulance service, said young Barry was a "gym rat. Barry did a good job but I think we needed a change," he said. Allman said that she thought highly of Obama, who was 'very intelligent and witty'. The man is staggering and numb but eventually pulls out forgotten dignity from under his flaking coat,/And walks a straight line along the crooked world.. They were. Likewise for Mr. Obama, it seems. He said that of the three, only Mr. Orme, another Punahou hoops player, was in the gang that Mr. Obama described. Ann and the boy lived with the Dunhams in Honolulu until Obama was 6. "Barry liked to draw heroes." "Stanley loved that little boy," said Abercrombie, now a Democratic congressman from Hawaii. The images from 1979 show a grinning 17-year-old Obama in a white suit with his arm around his date, Megan Hughes, before they headed to the party at Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii. The fourth person in the picture is Obama's date,Megan Hughes. I was certainly oblivious to a lot of what he references, Hale said in an interview. He has ethnic Chinese mother and his father was Polish. Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb, and Greg Orme-friends from Obama's high school daze in Hawaii-joined the president for a round on the links at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on Saturday morning. 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. That thoughtful poet is not remembered by any of his basketball buddies, coaches or friends. He laughed and posed for photos with friends. But Obama did get to play in the game when the school clinched the state title. Then his young mother, now divorced, met and married an Indonesian student studying at the University of Hawaii. 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'. You can see how he was much more sensitive than the other guys, even back then.. He would bring up worldly topics far beyond his years. "But looking back now I can see he was seeking more from those guys than that. In 2006, Mr. Obama used the family Christmas holiday there to decide whether to run for president. The same as in Washington, Orme said. Asked Saturday about Kakugawa's recollections, the Obama campaign declined to make the senator available. Throughout his youth, as depicted in his first book, he always found ways to meld into even the most uninviting of communities. She also shared a complimentary note that Obama had written in her high school yearbook. 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 . She became estranged from her husband, Barack Obama Sr., after his departure for Harvard and rarely saw the group of friends that they had made at the University of Hawaii. His spelling wasnt too good either, he said, referring to the note Obama wrote in his high school year book. But we never talked race." He also thanked the "Choom Gang," a reference to "chooming," Hawaiian slang for smoking marijuana. Bush remained pals with men he served with in World War II. The article included photos of a black man who had destroyed his skin with powerful chemical lighteners that promised to make him white. If you look at our teams, that year I was the only white guy on the starting five. The president turns 53 on Monday. "If this story is eight paragraphs, seven of them go to Greg. 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. Some of that crew has stayed in Hawaii, but others have moved off island. The race to track them down and coax them to open up likely will include reporters as well as opposition research experts for political rivals. Hes not like that.. "Barry's biggest struggles then were missing his parents. I am not giving any interviews, Obamas grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, curtly interjected when a reporter phoned. Obama, too, was about to journey far from these familiar shores. Obama admits in "Dreams" that during high school he frequently smoked marijuana, drank alcohol, even used cocaine occasionally. So just get the f--- outta my face." "I brood," Mr. Obama's friend Mr. Ramos said a few years ago. Among U.S. presidents, Obama is not alone in carving out time regularly to reconnect with his roots. In snapshots, the boy is a portrait of childhood bliss. His partners matched Monday's team of Greg Orme, Darrell Harrington and Bobby Titcomb, and the foursome spent more than five hours on the course. Our second string should be playing more.'" 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. Through the haze of the 70s, they recall only the rat baller who was always up for a game. "He challenged the coaches.. But one word Obama learned quickly in his new home was curang, which means "cheater." On Sunday evening, Titcomb hosted a barbecue at his beachfront home for the entire contingent from . Young Barack Obama in a 7th grade photo in 1974 at Punahou School, Honolulu, Hawaii. Furushima said that many of her classmates have expressed dismay at Obamas rendering of the past. For Orme, the Obama he saw on the court was a lot like the Obama who occupied the White House a team player who liked to win. They sought out parties, especially at the military bases on the island, where African-Americans would be in attendance. 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. "But he wanted to remain at Punahou. In Hawaii, our diversity defines us, it doesnt divide us, said Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii), a close friend of Obamas father in graduate school in the early 60s. He's lived in Colorado, but was listed as a North Carolina resident when in 2012 he attended a state dinner at the White House that Obama held for British Prime Minister David Cameron. Like Obama, Topolinski had to straddle a racial divide. Tucked away in someone elses shoe box of adolescent artifacts, there might be a picture of you in garish clothes and with an outdated do, your arm around a high school squeeze. Teachers, former playmates and friends recall a boy who never fully grasped their language and who was very quiet as a result. Many of the men were black. ', 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. Meanwhile, the search continues for Obamas closest high school friends -- the self-proclaimed Basketball Jones, who raced around the island in Darin Maurers two-toned beige VW van with the band Earth, Wind and Fire blaring from the cassette deck. Known as Ann throughout her adult life, she kept to herself. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. He'd pick them up if they fell down,'' Darmawan recalled. , updated Hed tell us to move on if we got into it with another player. "Those were robust years full of energy and cacophony, and she loved all of it," Soetoro-Ng said of her grandmother, who has lived alone since her husband died in 1992. 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. 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. There are, however, chapters in Obamas high school narrative that are not subject to dispute. The Los Angeles Times weighed in the other day. Obama, he said, was especially adept at knowing how to build relationships. He said it puzzles him that, as president, Obama was often accused of failing to reach out to political opponents. 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. Obama confirmed in an interview earlier this month that the Ray character in "Dreams" actually is Kakugawa. The experience of being part of a winning team was important to Barry, to all of us.. 18:47 GMT 23 May 2013. For me its the unconditional love, its the nontransactional nature of the relationship that enduring quality that is something that I really value, he said. The real Ray, Keith Kakugawa, is half black and half Japanese. I brood, Mr. Obamas friend Mr. Ramos said a few years ago. You are extremely sweet and foxy, he wrote. The number at Dunhams apartment in a nondescript Honolulu high rise has not changed in more than a quarter-century. Or Japanese. The term wasn't considered a slur at the time in Indonesia. "He was very intelligent and witty. "Not even close," he said, adding that Obama was dealing with "some inner turmoil" in those days. Mr. Titcomb was golfing with the president within hours of the Obamas Dec. 21 arrival on Oahu. "But it could be a lonely place. In an interview with the Tribune on Saturday, Kakugawa said he always considered himself mixed race, like so many of his friends in Hawaii, and was not an angry young black man. He then wrote down his number, encouraging Allman to give him a call, and signed off 'Barry Obama'. McLachlin said he told Obama he was volunteering for the American Heart Association and the president urged him to keep in touch. 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. Bobby Titcomb Photos Photos - US President Barack Obama repares to putt on the 18th green as friend Greg Orme retrieves his ball and Darell Harrington (2nd R) and Bobby Titcomb (R) look on at the . 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. Elite Dutch colonists once lived there; the Japanese moved in during their occupation of Indonesia in World War II. After Obama's prom date with Megan Hughes and before settling down with Michelle during his time studying at Harvard, President Obama seriously dated two women: Alex McNear was a 20-year-old literature lover he met at Occidental College in 1981 before he transferred to Columbia in his junior year. WASHINGTON President Obama has called Hawaii his refuge, and so it has been throughout his political life. He sketched decidedly American cartoon characters during class. But he wanted to make everybody happy." Topolinski, who now lives in Washington state, said he lost touch with Obama after high school and they moved into different political camps. Barack Obama as a baby. By The White House says President Obama has been updated on progress made by Iraqi force against the Islamic State group in Ramadi. In the early 1970s, diplomats and Indonesian businessmen lived there in fancy gated houses with wide paved roads and sculpted bushes. After a recent lunch with a reporter, he winked at a table of faculty-lounge colleagues and joked, This one is with Playgirl.. Barack in the Student Life section of Punahou Schools yearbook. Greg Orme, a fellow varsity basketball player, was Obamas constant companion. 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. The teacher, who still lives in Obama's old neighborhood, remembers that he always sat in the back corner of her classroom. The night, Obama later wrote, made him furious as he realized that whites held a "fundamental power" over blacks. 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. It was also how he wanted to be remembered. In the 2004 presidential campaign, both John F. Kerry and President Bush were embroiled in disputes over their Vietnam-era records, controversies that were stoked by the conflicting recollections of people who knew them. "All of them were imperfect but all of them loved him fiercely, and I believe he took the best qualities from each of them." Although their paths have long since diverged, they've made it a point to gather for frequent reunions, in one of Obama's most visible links to the days when his life was much simpler and his problems more mundane. He was probably studying them and learning from them. I would go out there and be the only white person. Some seem to make Obama look better in the retelling, others appear to exaggerate his outward struggles over issues of race, or simply skim over some of the most painful, private moments of his life. With rain drizzling over Oahu, Obama's motorcade whisked Obama across the island to Titcomb's beachside home in Waialua, about an hour outside of Honolulu on the North Shore. The 1979 photo was snapped inside the home of former classmate, Kelli Allman, who was the prom date of the pr, Fashion alert! In a newly unearthed photo published Thursday in TIME magazine, a 17-year-old Barack Obama is seen wearing a white dinner jacket as he poses with friends on the night of their senior prom in Hawaii. Their new neighborhood was only 3 miles to the west, but a world away. It is the same one that a young Obama wrote in the yearbook of a petite black-haired beauty named Kelli Furushima -- the object of his high school crush. Obama, however, was not a part of that group, according to Anthony and Smith. "It is a shame we have to worry so much about [grade point], but you know what the college entrance competition is these days," she wrote. Obama and his. Aging photos show Obama and Orme decked out in 1970s fashion with their dates before attending a high school prom. Now lots of people are interested in helping graduates of Punahou School jog their foggy memories, trolling for revelations about a young man who spent much of his time that season riding the bench. The U.S. military was expanding on the island of Oahu, home to the new capital of Honolulu. Increasingly, the reunions have become the focal point of Obama's family vacation in his second term as his teenage daughters spend less and less time at their father's side. Right: Obama wrote the above note in Allmans yearbook at the end of his senior year in 1979. And on Tuesday, in what's become a yearly tradition, the men and their families gathered for a luau hosted by Titcomb. It remains a refuge for me when I travel there during the winter, my family and I, and see friends from high school.. After their relationship, she went on to marry a Serbian Boxer named Bob Bozic who once tried to rob $60,000 from a bank. They have a different level of affection for you than friends you meet later in life. 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. The president was returning to the White House on Monday. The three men - Mike Ramos, Bobby Titcomb and Greg. But he took the high road and showed a lot of integrity. As much as he may have felt like an outsider at times, Obama rarely seemed to show it. Made a strong case for them.. By (Photo by Joaquin Siopack-Pool/Getty Images) "He didn't say what country he wanted to be president of. Life without a father It was a complicated time. He is 9 years old, living in Indonesia, where he and his mother moved with her new husband, Lolo Soetoro, a few years earlier. If someone is brown, they can be Samoan or Fijian or Tongan. This is the Barry I remember.. Obamas family is already insulating itself. Obama wasn't shy about advocating for himself and his fellow backup players, Lum said. Id put that up on e-Bay., Alan Lum, another teammate from the championship squad, who now teaches second grade at Punahou, has done enough interviews that his fellow teachers have started to rib him about his newfound fame. This article originally appeared in the May 23, 2013 edition of TIME magazine underneath the title, Obamas Grand Old Party. To subscribe to TIME, click here. Then there's the copy of Life magazine that Obama presents as his racial awakening at age 9. 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. But spokesman Bill Burton said Obama "stands by his recollections of these events as related in his book." He was loving and generous." Memories of a racial awakening? Obama played basketball at Punahou with Orme, who the alumni magazine says is now a building contractor. You need to find Greg Orme, instructed Obamas old basketball coach, Chris McLachin. Maurer, who played ball with Obama from the seventh grade through their senior year, said Julius Erving, better known as Dr. J, was their basketball hero. They were like brothers, says Allman. I don't know why Greg would want to spend anytime with me at all! I get one, maybe.. Hes been so gracious to him.. Or f------ Eskimo." With a trimmed Afro, Hawaiian flower leis around his neck, Obama was surrounded by the disparate people who shaped him.