classnews - Bowdoin College

was building something there. Wesleyan wasn’t really home.
Bowdoin was.”
During his senior year, Kondabolu was in his glory. Not
only did he help organize a global consciousness lecture
series, he was music director at WBOR and had his own
show on WBCN, “Laugh Out Loud with Hari Kondabolu.”
The first guest on “Laugh Out Loud” was President
Barry Mills.
“President Mills,” Hari asked impertinently, “are you a
virgin?”
“Well,” replied the unfazed President Mills, “I have three
children.”
“Just answer the question,” Kondabolu shot back.
When Barry Mills proved to be such a good sport about
being made sport of, Kondabolu knew he had made the
right decision in returning to Bowdoin.
“This is a place in the world I can perform freely,”
he says.
40 BOWDOIN SUMMER 2011
FROM HUMAN RIGHTS TO HUMAN COMEDY
When Hari Kondabolu graduated from Bowdoin,
however, he actually thought his performing days were
probably over. His post-grad focus was on becoming a
human rights activist not a stand-up comedian.
On summer breaks, Kondabolu had interned with
the Queens District Attorney’s hate crimes unit and,
through the Indian American Center for Political
Awareness’s Washington Leadership Program, in the
Washington, D.C., office of Sen. Hillary Clinton.
At Bowdoin, Kondabolu, Anjali Dotson ’04, and Sam
Terry ’04 organized a Hate Crimes Panel as part of
their Global Consciousness Lecture series. Kondabolu
credits Professor Henry Laurence, director of Asian
Studies, and Terry, his sophomore roommate, with
being the biggest influences on him when he was in
school.
“Sam Terry is somebody who changed my life, because
he forced me to question things,” says Kondabolu.
At Bowdoin, Kondabolu first used comedy almost as a coping mechanism,
performing stand-up routines around campus as a way of dealing with his sense
of isolation and alienation.