Today was a different kind of Rova day. When I discovered something had gone wrong with our transition to the government system (Betuach Leumi) paying for our health care I was not feeling a surge of enthusiasm for this country. The woman who had romantic notions of nobly making the ultimate sacrifice yesterday was now completely stressed and put out to have to sacrifice time, effort and pride to unravel the mess. Somehow dealing with forms and miscommunication doesn’t feel so romantic and noble.

So today I salute (and am in awe of) all the olim (immigrants to Israel) I know. These brave souls spend years being the greenhorns battling gaps in language, culture, and influence. They are not running from pogroms and the army like my ancestors did when they came to America. Instead they leave behind comfortable lives where they generally know what is going on to jump into a world where feeling foolish and incompetent is normal.