Barack Obama and Marty Nesbitt, Mr. Obama’s friend and campaign treasurer, walked along Kailua Beach. (Photo: Mike Burley/The Honolulu Star-Bulletin, via Associated Press)HONOLULU — Mention shave ice and plate lunch and you may get a Hawaiian’s attention. Greet someone with the slang, “Howzit?” and say goodbye with a flash of the “shaka” sign (fist closed, thumb and pinky extended) and you have established your credibility with Hawaii natives.
Senator Barack Obama may be a mainlander now, but in the opening days of his week-long vacation in Hawaii, he has shown off his local roots.
In what is likely to be the only public appearance of his trip, Mr. Obama, the presumed Democratic nominee, on Friday alluded to his vacation itinerary by highlighting some local favorites.
“I’m going to get a plate lunch. I might go to Zippy’s. I might go to Rainbow Drive-In. I haven’t decided yet. Get some Zip Min. I’m going to go get some shave ice. I’m going to go body surfing at an undisclosed location,” Mr. Obama told a crowd who had gathered hours before his arrival in Honolulu. “I’m going to see my tutu — my grandma — and I’m going to watch my girls play on the beach, and once in a while I might go into the water.”
Rainbow Drive-In and Zippy’s, home to the noodle dish Zip Min, are popular Honolulu eateries. And many islanders appear to be accepting Mr. Obama as one of their own once again. On Sunday the Honolulu Advertiser newspaper declared: “Obama connects with the plate lunch spirit on Hawaii vacation.”
But while he is drawing newspaper headlines and airtime on television stations across the state, a reminder of the political battle that awaits him across the ocean came in the form of television ads for Senator John McCain, which are now on the air in Hawaii.
Mr. Obama, who is staying at a rented home on the windward, or eastern, side of Oahu, has already visited his 85-year-old grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, twice, played 18 holes of golf and dined with his family at Alan Wong’s, a top Honolulu restaurant.
During a morning jog on Saturday Mr. Obama came close to another People magazine moment when a photographer snapped a photo of him running along the beach barefoot, clad in black shorts and a T-shirt. (He may be trying to avoid the bare-chested look that earned him a spot in the magazine’s “Beach Babes” feature in early 2007.)
But with all the local attention focused on him, Mr. Obama may not be able to avoid another shot like that even if, as he says, he’ll be headed for an “undisclosed location” to body surf. Even paradise has its hazards.
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A well desrved rest, and no better place than returning to ones place of birth.
— Lee GiabenelliThat Obama. So hot right now.
— MikeHow old was Obama when he left the islands?
— musingAh, that’s nice. Where was McCain born, again?
— BenIF Obama reconnects with his “island” or “aloha” spirit, I may reconsider.
— BJEven paradise has its hazards.????
— geniaI love the way you in the media justify what you are doing. Tabloid journalism has crossed over into the mainstream media.
Tonight I heard one reporter actually complain about the conditions he has to endure while Sen Obama is dinning and enjoying the beach… He made it sound as if Barack Obama was cruel to the press….Hello?! Press weren’t invited on the trip.
What a bunch of low life’s……can’t even let the man have a few days of rest.
Y’all waiting to catch him in that miss step, huh? Oh…that would be big…a feather in your caps, wow.
Meanwhile McCain is here telling more lies then I thought humanly possible …no body calling him on any of them…everyone is waiting to catch Barack Obama with his shirt off.
Well Done…boys…well done!!
Barack Obama isn’t a native Hawaiian as the above caption reads. There is a difference of being born in Hawaii as being a native Hawaiian. Senators Inoyue and Akaka are native Hawaiians. It seems as if the writers just love making up stuff about this person. It is completely unreal.
— cliff jonesIts called “the shocker” and its not Hawaiian, its under-age-25 American! Read your Urban Dictionary. This is just as bad as the media being fascinated with fist-bumps.
— Pat KnappIt’s nice that Obama is taking a week off to recharge after an intense year and half without let up.
— vwcatGood to do this during the summer lull with the Olympics going on and before the convention so he can be recharged for it and the battle in the fall.
Seeing McCain out there stumbling around and making all these gaffes. With him being so negative and cranky, only talking about what he won’t do rather then what he will, or offering something other then the trash talk he does about Obama, I think it’s time for him to take a week a visit his 8 homes and get some rest and recharge himself.
Maybe then he’ll have a positive vision or rediscover his old self and what made him popular in 2000. The new and tired McCain sounds like Rove retread.
Wow, this is a complete ‘feel-good-celeb-piece’ placed under US/POLITICS/WASHINGTON. It’s no wonder this rag is folding.
— SuperpowerObama picks and chooses certain aspects of his background to highlight, based on political convenience (I’m from Hawaii, I’m from Kansas, I’m black, I’m white, I’m Christian), but then claims its unfair when others mention those parts he is less proud of, such as his middle name, or the fact that his father was a muslim (and, yes, I know that he himself is not). There’s nothing unusual about that, it’s what politicians do; what’s more absurd is the way the media play along. Don’t hold your breath waiting for any stories about the muslim parts of Obama’s lineage. Ain’t gonna happen.
— J.H.I forget. When the Brady Bunch went to Hawaii, had they jumped the shark yet?
— John BailoWho cares????No news here….
— rc colaMcCain’s new ads lie about Senator Obama’s tax plans SEVEN TIMES.
McCain cannot win by telling the truth. Like all Republicans, he depends on the gullibility of Americans when presented by “statistics”.
Under Obama, NO TAXES WILL RISE for any family whose income is less than $250,000 per year. This includes most small businesses as well.
— JDA well deserved break from the rigors of voting for FISA, applauding getting rid of the handgun ban, asking to extend the death penalty, doing away with separation of church and state, destroying campaign finance limits, and throwing the environment under the bus with more new unsafe offshore drilling, and proposing sending another ten thousand American troops (people) to be killed and maimed in Afghanistan on another front of the ongoing middle east ground war for oil. Maybe this will give Obama a chance to discover his core values that he won’t change because of a new poll. Or at the very least maybe he’ll develop a sense of humor and stop yelling racism every time he gets criticism. Or tone down his off putting grandiose self-adoration. Or not.
— Steve PesceObama is a good leader in America.He is a good leader and good person also.
— AlisonGlad to see a sensible person running for President. It says a lot about his fitness for office that even over a year of attacks from Clinton/McCain haven’t caused him to lose his cool or his focus.
— trudyI define a native as the descendent of those who were first to sight and settle the island or land in question. As to those who who’s ancestors were not the
— kamanalonokapufirst to settle the land they are alians, foreigners, intruders, invaders and/or
occupiers, as the whiteman is now doing in Hawaii.
Cliff, as usual, you don’t check facts. Link to Wikipedia below.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama
Barack Obama was born on August 7, 1961 in Honolulu
JH, same link. Obama’s Christian and was never a Muslim. Stop sounding like David Duke and the KKK
Pesce, go “swim with the fishes”. Your obvious hatred and jealousy of Obama are disgusting. Nothing ever about policy, just personal attack.
For those harping on McCain’s birthplace in the Canal Zone. Same disdain from most of us. McCain is a natural born U.S. citizen on a number of counts.
Perhaps we can get back to some intelligent discussion, but that’s probably too much to hope
— Joe M” What a brave new World that has such people in it.” Let`s pray the hope of all mankind`s vacation is not cut short by the President calling a joint session of Congress into session as the Turks crash into Georgia, the Russians blow the world`s largest pipeline; the Kurds arise in South eastern Georgia to unite with their brothers in greater Kurdistan, an amporphous region from Central Iran all the way to Ankara in the west and Tiblisi in the North. The Russians are killing Georgians to protect the ethnic Russian minority; the Turks will go in to keep their Turkish kinsmen safe from both sides; the Kurds will use this as an excuse for more nation building.
— Charles B. TiffanySleep well patriots, Cheney is in charge while the President waves the flag and goes to church in the world`s largest China Town.
Here is why we should have been following Paul`s and Washington`s dicta for the last 225 years. Foreign entanglkements are dragging us down into a sea of uncertainty. I am glad to know that the senator was wearing a t-shirt while jogging; I guess he is taking John`s advice about skin cancer.
History may well write that Obama jogged while 20% of the Earth`s oil burned. Charles B. Tiffany
Kissimmee, Florida
Overheard from a 19 year-old: he hopes the vacationer, ooops Obama, got a discount on his Harvard education. ”Other than talking about change, he isn’t saying anything. What’s he going to do?? I can figure out that we need a stronger economy!” Ezactly, he isn’t saying anything. One smart kid.
— Patricia Barry#18 kamanalonokapu
you’re correct of course.
i’ve travelled a bit, but to the islands only once and went up country. encountered hostility [below the surface, but visible] from natives that was as intense as anywhere i’ve been.
i guess, if white people stole paradise from my great-grandfather, i wouldn’t look too kindly on them eather.
— JP, milltown, njBarack Obama isn’t a native Hawaiian as the above caption reads. There is a difference of being born in Hawaii as being a native Hawaiian. Senators Inoyue and Akaka are native Hawaiians. It seems as if the writers just love making up stuff about this person. It is completely unreal.
— Posted by cliff jones
If this is the case, then only native Americans (the people the United States in their good wisdom sentenced these people to reservations) are native to the United States. everyone else born here are not native to their states or this country. So, I would rethink your argument.
— NickHistory may well write that Obama jogged while 20% of the Earth`s oil burned. Charles B. Tiffany
Kissimmee, Florida
— Posted by Charles B. Tiffany
An attack on Barack Obama, while the commander in chief is in China? John McCain is calling Russia a totalitarian state? Actually, John McCain hopes this escalates so he has a real war he can fight. The problem is, if you are right, then there will not be a world left, as we know it, by the time 2012 rolls around. Maybe John McCain does support the concept that when the Mayan calendar ends on 21 December, 2012; he will control a new world order; a world in cinders.
— NickGod deliver us from our tabloid media who called themselves political reporters. Is there a way we can take the power of media away and give it to someone else?
The MSM has become a non-factor in this election. When are they going to call McCain out on his lies?
— Bee, Manchester, NH