Postcard from Honolulu: Reflections on the place where Barack Obama was born

A glimpse of Sandy Beach on O'ahu. The beach Barack Obama visits when he's in Hawai'i.

Touching down at Honolulu International Airport, I realized that this trip back to Hawai'i (the state where I was born), was different somehow. This was my first trip back since Honolulu born and bred Barack Obama became the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.  As we headed to my mom's house, I looked around and tried to imagine what it must have been like for him to grow up here.

People talk about places being melting pots, but Hawai'i truly is in every sense of the word. Combine a population descended from immigrants and missionaries, plop them on a rock in the middle of the Pacific and let them alone for several hundred years and you are going to see beautiful people of many mixed races that you won't see anywhere else.

My own mixture of Korean and Italian isn't unusual here. In fact, what is unusual is that I'm only a blend of two races. My daughters who are a combination of Korean, Italian, Irish, English, and Scottish with a little Mohawk thrown in for good measure would be more the norm.

So when I think about Barack Obama growing up here and saying that his story was only possible in America, I think about him living here in Honolulu and secretly think that he really means Hawai'i every time he says it. I know he has said (in Dreams From My Father) that he felt "different" for being part African, but I hope that most people here were more accepting than the few who made him feel like he was an anomaly.

I went to the same school that Barack Obama attended, Punahou School, a Christian Missionary school touted as the largest private school west of the Rockies. I remember feeling different, too. I had lived in Italy. My parents spoke Italian. My name is Italian and stood out in a class of Michelles, Allisons, and Lisas. Even the kids with the Hawaiian names seemed more "normal" to me. I wasn't 100% Japanese like the little girls I wanted to be friends with so badly. Though many people at the school were of mixed race, I longed to be just one thing, so I think I can understand Obama's feelings of not fitting in. I felt like I didn't fit in, either. I wouldn't have thought twice about a mixed-race African and Caucasian boy in my class. I was too busy longing to be Japanese: slight, with straight jet-black hair, like the girls I admired so much. Looking back, however, it was all in my head. Does anybody feel like they really fit in in school?

I admit that while I have been on vacation, I have chosen to be completely out of touch with all things political. When my mom, an ardent Obama supporter, brought up the Access Hollywood interview with Obama's family, I had no idea what she was talking about. I saw the New Yorker cover yesterday and could only shake my head. I had left my outrage back home. Have I been out of it for too long?

Last week we attended a dinner where two things happened: we met a family from Dallas who had no problem talking about how much this election meant to them. Their college-attending daughters, ages 18 and 21, were actively campaigning, couldn't wait to vote...for McCain. Their logic? "We just can't pull out of Iraq. We have to support our troops." To which I absolutely agreed (in my head): No, we can't just pull out, we need a plan.  We have to support our troops--and, yes, I do, just not the war. Military personnel are everywhere here in Hawai'i, there are countless bases just on just this island alone. It's impossible not to think about what they are training for when you are here. But, I admit, I didn't have the energy to counter them, even though they brought the topic up. We were at dinner, they were guests of my aunt and uncle. I kept my mouth closed.

The second thing:  A friend of my aunt's walked up to the table. She's an older lady, very active in politics, even help to start a Democratic women's caucus here in Hawaii. My mom introduced us and said, "You should talk to her, she was a member of the Electoral College. When have you ever met a member of the Electoral College before?" My eyes brightened. I imagined meeting her another day for an interview. She sat down next to me and immediately filled my head. I told her about MOMocrats, she was delighted. She spoke about women politicians and how much she admired what they had to endure to get elected. She spoke about Hillary Clinton and how disappointed she was that she wasn't the nominee. She told me that we needed to unify against McCain, but I could see that she was still crushed over Clinton's loss.  "She deserves to be president," she said, and again I nodded without saying anything. Then she paused and added, shaking her head, "I just...I just can't believe a Black man is going to be president before a woman."

My mouth fell open. Just then our drinks arrived so I didn't have a chance for a retort. I sat through the rest of dinner in kind of a daze. Gone was the intention to interview her. Gone--in a flash--was my respect for her.  And then I realized what a poison people like her were in our country. You just never know what someone is thinking.

"Why would she say this to me?" I wondered. What about me gave her the signal that it would be okay to say something so profoundly racist? I was mad at her and myself for not speaking out.  Had the gentle ocean breezes and the hot sun mellowed me too much?  I felt out of it for being out of the loop with political current events. I ignored her for the rest of the dinner.

When we got into the car, I told my mother what the lady said. My mom was disbelieving, "NO..."  I assured her that those words came out of her mouth. I sat for the rest of the ride home wondering how many other people must feel that way. How many Democrats—people in my own party—shared her racist view?

The next day, the sun was shining brightly and we headed to the beach. I sat for a long time thinking about the previous night's events. I watched my kids playing in the sand next to similarly "chop suey" kids, I couldn't help but think about the future. I wanted to protect my children from people with those beliefs. I wanted them to remain open-minded and loving-hearted. I thought about what Barack Obama's presidency would mean to them when they were older.   For me, it's not important that he's a man or that he identifies as African-American. For me, he is a local boy, culturally "all-crazy-mixed-up" like my girls, has lived in a foreign country like me, Hawai'i's native son, a product of this warm, sunny, friendly, family-oriented place. I relate to him in that sense and because I understand the culture and community that shaped his world view, I know he will be a great president.

Much aloha to Hawai'i and this vacation for helping me to reconnect with that feeling.

Stefania Pomponi Butler is headed to the beach.

Comments

[Amelia Sprout]

As someone raised to be a political activist, things like this have made me drop out of the political scene. I have seen and heard more blatently racist things come out of lifelong Democrats mouths than I care to admit to. It breaks my heart to a point that I just don't want to participate anymore. Like a sour grape, or an unexpected bit of sand in your spinach, it has spoiled it, taken the enjoyment away. Even my own family has said things like that, and they are the ones that raised me to think that this would happen, that it should happen. I really admire what the women here are doing, because it is the right fight, the good fight. Thank you.

[cynematic]

Lovely meditation on Hawaii, and its meaning to you and Senator Obama. I know you supported Edwards at first, CityMama, but Obama had me at "howzit." (Then again, I was a Deaniac, so it kinda makes sense.)

Call me a dreamer, but I think we can elect Obama president *in spite of* the racism and sexism and all the other -isms we're afflicted with in this country.

He's most able, has the best plans, and shows the best combination of judgment backed by record.

We're peering at the brink of a major recession, if not Second Depression (I'm in SoCal with front seats to the IndyMac bank run, so I'm allowed to be melodramatic)--in short, our problems are so huge we need the best and brightest to solve them.

And I'm not seeing how anyone could call McCain the best and the brightest--of anything.

[Sally White]

Thank you for the wonderful story. I share your line of thought and am shocked, that America, which professes to be so liberal and is out to "liberate" the rest of the world is so close-minded here. Why do we live narrow-minded on our narrow-minded streets? India, Bangladesh, Liberia and Pakistan have had women presidents. It wasn't a question of whether they were women, it was more about who was the better candidate. How come these things are still questioned right here in America, a country that calls itself progressive and liberal? I'm supporting Obama!!! Go Obama! Please visit WHyOBAMA08.org

[Stefania]

Sally White, I am asking the same questions as you. America, Land of Opportunity...or is it? We'll see come November.

[Kady]

I loved this post, Stefania. I have also had multiple people confess to me that they couldn't believe that a black man would be President before a woman, people that I've known for years. And call me naive, but I genuinely believe that (1) these folks do not consider themselves racist and (2) these were people I've never seen behave in any way that would suggest that they are racist. So given my faith in these people, I can only believe that their overtly racist remarks was merely an indelicate phrasing of their disbelief that, given the racism that in fact still exists in America, it shocked them that apparently, sexism is worse.

Of course, the true shame isn't that we'll have a black president before a woman president or, if Hillary had prevailed, a woman president before a black president. It is the fact that it has taken us so long to have anyone but a white man as president.

(And what about this thought - I have no doubt that we will have both a woman and a black and maybe even a black woman president, before we have a president who is not a Christian of some form. Which is, of course, what that New Yorker cover was all about.)

[Liz]

I agree with Kady that it is simply unbelievable that it has taken us so long in this country to have anyone other than a white man as president. I don't believe that the woman's remark was racist - unless you believe she was implying that a black man SHOULDN'T be president, hard to judge without being there to hear her tone. I'm amazed myself that this could actually happen, and then I get sad when I realize what it says about our country that this should be such an amazing thing.

Thanks for the description of growing up in Hawaii, it was really touching.

[Daisy]

I, too, am disappointed that Hillary is not the nominee. However, I believe Obama is the best choice. McCain is no choice at all. Male or female, black or white, it's taken our so-called progressive nation much too long to break out of the Mustbeawhitemale philosophy of leadership.