Maya Soetoro-Ng

Maya Kasandra Soetoro-Ng (/ˈmaɪ.ə suːˈtɔəroʊ ˈɪŋ/; born August 15, 1970) is the maternal half-sister of United States President Barack Obama. Formerly a high school history teacher, she is currently an Assistant Faculty Specialist at the Spark M. Matsunaga Institute for Peace & Conflict Resolution, which is based in the College of Social Sciences at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Early life

Soetoro-Ng was born Maya Kasandra Soetoro in Saint Carolus Hospital, a Roman Catholic hospital, in Jakarta, Indonesia, to Indonesian businessman Lolo Soetoro and American cultural anthropologist Ann Dunham. Her elder half-brother is the 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama. She has said she was named after American poet Maya Angelou.

Soetoro-Ng and Obama spent several years together in Indonesia and in Hawaii before her mother decided to return to Indonesia with her. After her parents divorced in 1980, her father remarried. From this marriage, Soetoro-Ng has another half-brother, Yusuf Aji Soetoro (b. 1981), and a half-sister, Rahayu Nurmaida Soetoro (b. 1984).