Indonesia left deep imprint on Obama family

al Reuters via Yahoo! News ^ | March 22, 2008 | Ed Davies

[2ndDivisionVet]

JAKARTA (Reuters) - A small group of Indonesians in their late 40s who attended the same elementary school in central Jakarta recently gathered for a reunion and to pledge their support for an absent former classmate -- Barack Obama.

Obama's late mother came to Indonesia with her young son in the late 1960s to join her second husband knowing next to nothing about the huge, developing Southeast Asian nation.

While her son left after four years to study in Hawaii, for the Kansas-born mother of the Democratic Party presidential hopeful the relationship with Indonesia was to grow into a lifetime affair.

Eschewing many of the cocktail parties and golf-type events in the expatriate community, friends said she tried to dig deep into the local culture and made many Indonesian friends.

"She wasn't the typical expat, who just experienced Indonesia from behind the windows of a chauffeur-driven limousine," said author and columnist Julia Suryakusuma, who became a friend of Obama's mother Ann Dunham in 1981.

For a six-year-old Obama too, the chaotic tropical nation clearly had an impact when he arrived with his mother, then 24, from Hawaii to join his Indonesian stepfather Lolo Soetoro.

He recounts in his book "Dreams from My Father" being amazed to find the house they moved into on the outskirts of Jakarta had a collection of exotic animals including a monkey, birds of paradise, a cockatoo and even several baby crocodiles.

CALIBRATING MISERY

The grinding poverty of Indonesia was also a shock to the young boy and his mother, whom he said would initially give over her money freely to the countless beggars with outstretched arms.

"Later, when it became clear that the tide of pain was endless, she gave more selectively, learning to calibrate the levels of misery," Obama wrote in the best-selling book, where he also recounts his mother's initial loneliness in Indonesia.

She threw herself into a job teaching English to Indonesian business executives at the American embassy, but was never happy playing the expatriate wife from all accounts.

Obama's stepfather, who Dunham wed after her marriage to the senator's Kenyan father ended, started working for an American oil company and would grumble about his wife's refusal to attend company dinner parties with him.

John McGlynn, a friend and long-term resident of Jakarta, also recalls Dunham as someone who preferred a more local scene despite her access to expat circles and was fun to be around.

"She could enjoy a G&T and a good argument," said McGlynn.

Obama, who describes in his book his mother as "the kindest, most generous spirit I have ever known," recalls her dedication to his education -- he was set a stiff regimen whereby he was woken by her at 4 a.m. for English lessons before school.

In Jakarta, Obama went to a Catholic school and then State Elementary School Menteng 01, attended by pupils of many faiths in a posh leafy suburb. Insight, a conservative magazine, reported on its Web site last year that Obama had attended what it called a radical madrassa, or Islamic school, a story that has since died a natural death.

In these formative years in a new land, Obama recounts how he turned to guidance from his stepfather, who later separated from his mother and died in 1987. Soetoro tried to teach his stepson to box after he was bashed by an older boy and introduced him to exotic foods from snake meat to roasted grasshopper.

Obama's Indonesia experience was cut short in 1971 when he was sent to attend an American school and live with grandparents in Hawaii, while Dunham stayed on with her husband.

"It's not easy for a mother to be separated from her child when he was only 10 at the time if she didn't really think that it was really important," said Suryakusuma.

Fluent in Bahasa Indonesia, Obama's mother went on to pursue work with NGOs and as an academic often focusing on Indonesia.

This included spells for USAID and in the Jakarta office of the Ford Foundation from 1981-84, where much of her work revolved around women's livelihoods and women's rights.

As an anthropologist, she also wrote a research paper when at the University of Hawaii on cottage industries such as blacksmithing and weaving in Java.

OBAMA FAN CLUB

Dunham, who died of cancer in 1995 at the age of 52, spent a lot of time in Indonesian villages and was close to the "orang kecil" (ordinary people), said Suryakusuma.

"Indonesia was home to her. It wasn't just a place where she did anthropological research and where she worked," she added, noting how proud Dunham would have been of her son.

Pride in the Obama link was also evident at the recent gathering of former Jakarta classmates of the U.S. senator.

Widiyanto Hendro, 48, who sat next to Obama in 4th grade, said Obama sometimes struggled to make himself understood in Indonesian and at times used hand-signals to communicate.

While Hendro said Obama did not appear an exceptional student at that time, he noted a special talent.

"He could draw things such as Spiderman, Bat-Man with his left hand and those drawings were very beautiful."

Another classmate, Cut Citra Dewi, 47, remembers him having a mischievous streak that meant he often pulled the girls' hair.

The group of students plan to establish a fan club at the elementary school to back Obama's presidential bid.

"Hopefully he will still remember his friends here," said Hendro.

[2ndDivisionVet]

Interesting article.

[samtheman]

And when Obama is President his shoe is going to leave a deep imprint on all our faces.

[Baladas]

Aint gonna happen - they can go ahead and nominate him, I double-dog dare them....Hello, President Juan!

[samtheman]

I hope you’re right, but don’t be so sure.

Mr. ChickensHomeToRoost has:

1. Money
2. Hordes of swooning, adulating followers
3. The certainty of polling 150%-200% of the black vote in every precinct in America
4. The media
5. The media
6. The media

[Red_Devil 232]

We need to worry about all six of your points! Especially #2!

[Beckwith]

ping!

Have you seen this?

[Beckwith]

Obama's stepfather, who Dunham wed after her marriage to the senator's Kenyan father ended, started working for an American oil company and would grumble about his wife's refusal to attend company dinner parties with him.

In "Dreams," Obama sheds some light on his formative years and the political views of his mother, an anthropologist and Islamophile who hated America and subsequently goes native.

"Looking back, I'm not sure Lolo ever fully understood what my mother was going through ... why the things he was working so hard to provide for her seemed only to increase the distance between them ... He landed a job in the government relations department of an American oil company. ... Sometimes I would overhear him and my mother arguing in their bedroom, usually about her refusal to attend his company dinner parties, where American businessmen from Texas and Louisiana would slap Lolo's back and boast about the palms they had greased to obtain the new offshore drilling rights, while their wives complained to my mother about the quality of Indonesian help. He would ask her how it would look for him to go alone, and remind her that these were her own people, and my mother's voice would rise to almost a shout."

"They are not my people!"

The Obama File

[ikka]

Obama's mother marries an African at 18, and anyone who knew anything about Africa could have told her about their polygamous ways.

Then at 24 she is married to an Indonesian who is trying to work hard and make good with Americans, and she won't go to American parties!

I get the feeling that Mom was kind of ... stupid.

[nightmarewhileawake]

where are the 527’s we need them now.
we need to get his poll numbers down.
the possiblity of this character as POTUS is frightening.
grap your pocketbooks and hold on for dear life if he gets in.
typical white people will have h—l to pay.
he took his grandma’s money and love and thru her under the bus ... what will he do for the average(typical) white American.

[popdonnelly]

The more I read about Obama, the more I have to believe that he has severe problems with American society. I would not trust this guy with the power of the Presidency.

[ThreePuttinDude]

Obama’s Indonesia experience was cut short in 1971 when he was sent to attend an
American school and live with grandparents in Hawaii, while Dunham stayed on with her husband

Thanks for posting this article. I've wondered about this guy for a long time.
He was born Aug. 4th 1961 in Honolulu
and then returned to Hawaii in 1971 to live with his "white"
grandparents. So he only lived with his "ex-pat" mother for 10 years. He only lived with
with his Black father for the first 2 years of his life, yet he claims he's black.

I'm having a hard time here.
Just by the time line of his life he has had more of a white influence than black.
Yet he claims to be a black man.

After graduation from High School, he went to Occidental College in LA.
received his two year degree, and off to NYC to Columbia University. Then to Harvard Law.
Not bad for a poor black kid without maternal direction. Something doesn't smell right here.

[FFranco]

If Obama wins, it will mean the end of majority rule in America. The minority will oppress the great mass of the citizens of our Nation.

[clamper1797]

Indonesia left deep Muslim imprint on Obama

[353FMG]

“The minority will oppress the great mass of the citizens of our Nation.”

Aren’t they already doing it? Don’t minorities already have more privileges than their numbers warrant?

[syriacus]

Dunham, ... was close to the "orang kecil" (ordinary people),

Obama's mother was close to TIPs, Typical Indonesian People.

[Fred Nerks]

Not bad for a poor black kid without maternal direction. Something doesn't smell right here.

Obama's left hand is on the shoulder of Kezia, Obama Sr.'s first wife, who said, "The first time I met Barack Jr. was when he came to Kenya in 1985. He was so much like his father, his looks, his voice, everything. It was like seeing my husband all over again."

In addition to Obama's half-sister, Auma (Obama's right hand), Kezia has three sons by Barack Sr. Her two youngest, Bernard and Abo, live in Nairobi. They are all Muslims.

THE OBAMA FILE. link.

I agree with your comment, there's something missing. Most reports show obama visited Kenya in 2006 - but he first met his Kenyan family in 1986. Thus the title of his book: Dreams of my Father. IMO obama accepted his Luo/muslim heritage on this visit.