I viewed Shabbos as my chance to experience places I might never have the opportunity to visit again

I ’ve always been an adventurer. Homesick? Nah, not me. Well, except for that second night in seminary, when I was so miserably jet-lagged that my eyes refused to close and my brain refused to budge, and tears choked my throat as I spoke to Mommy at two a.m. on the third-floor couch in my purple bathrobe.

Call it maturity, call it farsightedness, call it an upbringing that valued the majesty and mystery of artzeinu hakedoshah. Somehow, I was determined to actively make the most of being in Eretz Yisrael this year.

I viewed Shabbos as my chance to experience places I might never have the opportunity to visit again. It was almost too easy to be true. All I had to do was find someone else willing to come along with me, decide on any city we wanted, put our names on a list, and wait to be placed at a kosher, seminary-approved host who was happy to have us. Unbelievable!

Oh, and I wasn’t afraid to use my American-accented, Bais Yaakov-style Hebrew, either.

But I had to wait until my second week to get moving.