Barack Hussein Obama II was born in Honolulu, Hawaii on August 4 1961. He attended a number of schools in Jakarta, Indonesia where his mother was working before settling at the Punahou School back in Honolulu, where he lived with his grandparents, from the fifth grade until he graduated from high school in 1979.
Having left high school, Obama moved to Los Angeles where he attended Occidental College for two years. He then transferred to Columbia University in New York where he majored in Political Science, specializing in International Relations. He graduated in 1983. For the next five years, Obama had a number of jobs both in New York City and then in Chicago.