Hawai'i has pretty well been picked over for tidbits about Barack Obama's life. Now that he is coming home for an extended visit, there will be another round of digging for high school photos and a new collection of signs going up in restaurants proclaiming "Barry Obama ate here." There may even be some hopeful, if not opportunistic, fabrications.

But amid the tall tales of "I served Barack Obama a teri- burger one time" is a jewel of a true story: a local guy who went to Africa twice to see his friend, Barack Obama Sr., father of the U.S. senator. He has photos to prove it.

A. Pake Zane, affable owner of Antiques Alley on Kapi'olani Boulevard, got to know the elder Obama when the two were studying at the University of Hawai'i in the early 1960s. They didn't have classes together, but they met at a bar that served cheap tuna sandwiches and got to be buddies.

"I called him Barack," Zane says, with the emphasis on the first syllable. "So now when I hear 'Ba-RAHK' I get confused."

Zane was quite a world traveler in his day, backpacking across Europe and Asia and making his way to Africa. His first trip to Kenya to visit his friend Barack Obama was in 1969. He went again in 1974 with his wife, Julie Lauster. It wasn't so much that they planned to visit him. Their wandering, globe-trekking journeys took them to Africa, so they gave him a call.

"Barack, the father, had the most beautiful speaking voice," Lauster remembers. "He could be in a crowded room and he'd speak, and everyone would turn to listen. That's where the son gets it from."

Zane has been fielding calls from reporters and biographers looking for information on Barack Obama Sr., the Kenyan economist who died in 1982 at age 46. Zane has granted interviews to The Washington Post and Boston Globe and also to a film documentary crew.

But he hasn't yet let anyone publish the photos. Zane describes mountains of boxes at his house that he had to sort through to find the small stash of pictures. One is of the elder Obama surrounded by his extended family. In another, Zane is holding a child and standing with Obama. He thinks there might be more photos somewhere in the boxes.

Zane is considering the photos carefully, not knowing what to do with them. He would allow them to be published — for a price — but it would have to be the right publication with the right intention.

"This is my dilemma," he says. "What do I do with these pictures?"

Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.