Yesh Gleetch

Oftentimes, when something goes wrong in an Israeli government office, they blame it on a 'Gleetch B'system'. The difference between an American glitch and an Israeli 'gleetch', is that in America it really is an unforeseen computer malfunction through no human error of their own. Here in Israel though, a gleetch is entirely human error. They physically deleted your name from the system and call it a gleetch.

I'm in the process of trying to get my 4 your old son approved for speech therapy. I've been warned many times over that this is a process that will make you want to hang yourself. It takes months and months of legwork, forms, and tests (which all need to be MAILED in) before they'll even call you down for an evaluation appointment, and after that, it takes many months more while they take vacation, drink coffee, and delete your name from their system. Any attempt on your part to somehow expedite the process, such as suggesting such 21st century conveniences as fax or email, will go unheeded. I was genuinely surprised they didn't make me send over my forms via horse and buggy.

So I had finally gathered all the requisite paperwork. I had the ten pages filled out by his Gan teacher, I had the seven and a half pages filled out by myself, (with some linguistic assistance from my 8 year old, but that's neither here nor there.) I had the various test results from the doctor as well as the hearing test results, (Making THAT appointment would be an entire blog post on its own.), and all this was MAILED to the office for approval. Finally...FINALLY...after months of waiting...waiting...they called us for an appointment.

The day finally came. The culmination of almost a year of forms, tests, and runaround. We get to their office. We step up to the counter. They look at us, smile, and say, "Who are you? We don't have your forms here."

Turns out, she explained, that they had moved offices recently, and due to an unforeseen "gleetch", an entire carton of paperwork got "lost in the move".

Lost in the move?!
Did they lose a desk?
Did they lose a therapist?
Why did the receptionist arrive at the new location unscathed, but not my file? Frankly, I'd rather the file.

So we're starting the process again. Hopefully, there will be no 'gleetches' in the system. At this point I wouldn't be surprised if after all this I get a letter in the mail that due to a gleetch in the system, he's finally been approved...

...for a mortgage.