When Obama was mistaken for waiter and valet

WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama say they have been mistaken for valet and wait staff on their journey to the White House despite the progress America has seen in race relations.

The First Couple sat down for a candid conversation with People magazine on racism in American amid a fervid debate on the issue after a raft of white-on-black killings. "There's no black male my age, who's a professional, who hasn't come out of a restaurant and is waiting for their car and somebody didn't hand them their car keys," the President told the magazine, confirming that he had experienced being taken for a valet.

The President was joined by the First Lady for an interview on, "How We Deal with Our Own Racist Experiences," that will hit the stands on Friday. On her part, Michelle Obama related that even as the First Lady, during a visit she took to a Target (Departmental) store, the only person who came up to her in the store was a woman who asked her to help take something off a shelf. "Because she didn't see me as the first lady, she saw me as someone who could help her. Those kinds of things happen in life. So it isn't anything new," she said.

The interview came amid chatter that the First Couple were insulated from — or had grown out of — the racial discrimination that black experience every day and that the President was cold to the suffering of African-Americans.

The First Lady contested that. "I think people forget that we've lived in the White House for six years," she said. "Before that, Barack Obama was a black man that lived on the South Side of Chicago, who had his share of troubles catching cabs."

She also recalled another incident when Obama was wearing a tuxedo at a black-tie dinner, and somebody asked him to get coffee.

There was have other eyewitness accounts of how Obama was subjected to prejudice even after he entered elite circles. A Wall Street Journal reporter once wrote about how she witnessed Obama get the rough end of the stereotype at a New York City book party hosted by Tina Brown in 2003.

The reporter had been chatting with Obama at the party and when they finished their conversation, another guest walked up to her and inquired after the man's identity, admitting that he had mistaken him for the wait staff.

The man, an established author, "sheepishly he told me he didn't know that Obama was a guest at the party, and had asked him to fetch him a drink. In less than six years, Obama has gone from being mistaken for a waiter among the New York media elite, to the president-elect," the journalist, Katie Rosman, had written.

However, the president said in the People interview that the small irritations or indignities that he and his wife experienced are nothing compared to what a previous generation experienced.

"It's one thing for me to be mistaken for a waiter at a gala. It's another thing for my son to be mistaken for a robber and to be handcuffed, or worse, if he happens to be walking down the street and is dressed the way teenagers dress," Obama said.