You can’t really understand Barack until you understand Hawaii.” said Michelle Obama.
Hawaii will always be home for President Barack Obama. There can be no doubt that growing up in this idyllic, multicultural setting was a major influence in shaping who Obama is today.
The paternal home village of US President Barack Obama, located near Kenya‚s lakeside city of Kisumu, is due to get a 25 bedroom hotel built, after the Kenya Tourist Development Corporation has agreed to co-finance the project with an investor. The hotel owner is searching for collectibles and pictures from Hawaii to exhibit president’s Obama’s background. Hawaii visitors will receive a special “kamaaina” welcome.
Kogelo has risen to instant fame when Obama won the last presidential elections in the United States, as his late father came from Nyanza province. Blood relatives of Obama still live in Kogelo and the wider neighbourhood of that village and he himself has visited his late father‚s homestead on previous visits to Kenya, the last one while a member of the US Senate.
The planned hotel will undoubtedly facilitate more visitors to come and stay overnight at the location, instead of doing day visits and excursions from Kisumu itself. The lake side city is well connected with the capital Nairobi by air with Kenya Airways, Fly540 and Jetlink while road and rail transport are also available to reach Kisumu, making it easy for travellers to do a quick side trip‚ and see where the current US President has his other roots‚ besides his late mother‚s home U.S. State of Hawaii that is.
President Obama’s place of birth has been established to be Hawaii. He was born on August 4, 1961 at Kopi’olani Medical Center for Women only two years after Hawaii had become a U.S. state (1959). The birth announcements and the Leo President’s birth certification are available online.
President Obama’s dad, named Barack Hussein Obama, became a “Sr.” once his son was born and the son was given the same name, Barack Hussein Obama, Jr.
His dad was born in Kenya, so some people get them confused. Right after Stanley Ann (his Caucasian mom and a free spirit) gave birth to Baby Barack in August, the couple separated, and Barack Sr. applied for admittance to (and was accepted for) the spring semester at Harvard, where he majored in Business Management with a minor in Economics.
His mom took a brief maternity leave and drew foodstamps for the first few months of her baby boy’s life, but then returned to her Anthropology with a minor in Economics for Women in Developing Countries at Hawaii University (she completed her degrees all the way to Ph.D.).
His mom then remarried an Indonesian man, so when her son was around 6 years old the new family moved to Indonesia, where his mom worked at the U.S. Embassy. When young Barack Obama was around 8 years old, he was sent back to Hawaii to be raised by his maternal grandparents, where he remained until his college days.
Some of the rumors out there say: Obama was adopted by Indonesian Lolo Soetoro in the 1970s, and his name was legally changed to Barry Soetoro at that time, is most likely the reason he is spending millions of dollars to hide his birth certificate. He never filed the papers to change his name back to “Barack Hussein Obama, Jr.”, so any birth certificate produced by the state of Hawaii would list him as “Barry Soetoro”.
In Kenya several tour companies, located in both Kisumu and Nairobi, have regular tours‚ available to visit Kogelo, particularly for visitors from the US but interesting enough also for tourists from other parts of the world. The new hotel will be built in the immediate vicinity of the compound where several of Obama‚s relatives live and farm, giving guests of the hotel direct‚ shoulder rubbing with the paternal family of the US president, but without the hassles of the US Secret Service‚ forbidding presence. GO VISIT AND ALOHA!