I Can Be Obama

Yes, I can.

Mommy cried when Barack Obama gave his US presidential election victory speech at 4 am on Wednesday (or maybe she cried because I’d kept her up all night). She told me that Obama is a beacon of hope for many people around the world. Then she said I was the light of Mommy and Daddy’s life (Daddy verified this so it must be true) therefore, I am their Obama, only smaller and cuter (though he isn't half-bad, according to her). When I grow up, I could be as inspirational as he is (or more, she said; my mommy doesn’t expect much)!

Mommy and Daddy said (all this at the crack of dawn) that I have a lot in common with President-elect Obama. I am a ‘half-outsider’ like him with an ‘unusual’ (but beautiful- Daddy emphasised) name. They hope, like him, these things can be my strength rather than my Achilles Heel (some kind of wonky body part). Like him, they hope, I can succeed on my own terms, shrugging off labels and stereotypes, proudly owning both sides of my heritage, and never watering down who I am to suit other people.

Barack Obama didn’t run to the Deed Poll people when his countrymen couldn’t tell him apart from Osama Bin Laden. When they made fun of a picture of him in a turban, he didn’t disown his Kenyan background, nor did he distance himself from his white family when some people questioned whether he was truly ‘black’. That’s the man Mommy and Daddy believe I can be (not half-Kenyan and half-American, you understand, though I could legitimately sport a turban).

If I am that kind of guy, Mommy says, the world would be my oyster. Maybe a half-closed oyster that has to be prised open, like it is with a lot of people outside the ‘mainstream’. I might have to chip away at it long and hard before opportunities open up to me, but if I have talent and guts and determination (which I shall have in spades, my parents said), then I could make it mine.

I can be Obama. Yes, I can.

But I’d rather be Lewis Hamilton (it looks like more fun)!

Note: Pictured here with my running mate Gerry the Giraffe, who is of African origin; a truly diverse partnership!