Re: Where are you from?

[Inna Barmash <ibarmash...>]

Hello,

I was born in Vilna, Lithuania (then Soviet Union), and before moving to
the States in 1991, I had a chance to be part of an incredible Jewish
cultural revival in Lithuania.  I sang in the children's ensemble
"Aliyah" (and the name gives away where most of its former participants
now live), studied Yiddish and Hebrew, and learned my first ABCs of
Jewish traditions. When I was 12, my family moved to Fair Lawn, NJ,
where my parents still live.

In college, at Princeton, I found some klezmer soulmates, and we got a
great band going, The Klez Dispensers (check out
http://www.klezdispensers.com).  So after four years in school in
Princeton, NJ, I have now safely landed in Manhattan on the Upper West
Side, consulting by day and dispensing klez by night (and weekends). In
the klezmer community I have encountered in the States and London this
past summer, I have again found an inspiring, pulsating, vibrant
community that reminds me of the days of the post-Soviet Jewish revival
in Vilna.

I've really been enjoying this thread and I hope to see more responses,
especially from some of the non-American list members!

Take care,
Inna



Seth Rogovoy wrote:

>      I grew up in Midwood, Brooklyn, New York City (Andy
>      Statman's current neighborhood) and now live in Spuyten
>      Duyvil, the Bronx, NYC.  (BTW, I believe that Ari and I were
>      in the Junior Year Abroad program at Hebrew University in
>      Jerusalem the same school year.) Bob WienerI've enjoyed this
>      thread and wanted to thank Bob for getting the ball
>      rolling.I've lived in the Berkshires of western
>      Massachusetts for the last 25 years or so (with brief,
>      year-long stints in Israel and Manhattan in the early-mid
>      1980s). Mostly in Williamstown, but more recently in Great
>      Barrington, where we've been for the past year and where
>      we'll be probably for the next 8-10 years or so.In keeping
>      with the Andy Statman orientation, I was born and lived in
>      Jackson Heights, Queens, for the first few years of my life,
>      which is Andy Statman's original neighborhood.Then, like
>      George's family did to him, my family ruined my life by
>      moving us out to Long Island, but even further east than
>      George, all the way out to Bay SHore and then Islip, in
>      Suffolk County. I've never forgiven them.Fortunately, my
>      grandparents and cousins mostly stayed put in New York, so I
>      had plenty of doses of the old country on visits to their
>      places.Our plan is to move back to the old country (New
>      York) (my wife was born in Brooklyn but grew up in Boston)
>      after the kids are grown and out of the house.--Seth Rogovoy
>