Israeli Singer Inbar Bakal Finds Her Roots ... in California
Inbar Bakal is a little nervous about the trip to Israel she's making this month. Sure, it's been three years since she's been there. But it's where the Tel Aviv native grew up, where she learned and performed music both in classical choirs and folk contexts, and where she served in the military -- two years as an intelligence officer in the anti-aircraft division (the first female to hold that position) and two doing international relations. Six years living in the U.S., though, has brought some changes, she says. To her perspective on her identity. And to her music.
On the former, she returns with some deeper appreciation and a sense that maybe she needed to be outside Israeli life for a bit to realize how much a part of her it is.
"Being a Jewish person in Israel, I was taking it for granted," she says, even with coming from a mixed heritage of an Iraqi-born father and a Yemenite mother. "You're not really thinking about your identity. Holidays are holidays. You're with your family. Everyone around you is Jewish. Coming here it was very much, 'OK, I'm without my family, without my friends. How do I fit in my identity?' And finding that was important to me."
Continue reading Israeli Singer Inbar Bakal Finds Her Roots ... in California
Posted by Steve Hochman on Jun 9th 2009 2:00PM
Filed under: Around the World








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