Sariah

Now, over the last three weeks I've been told many things about my name:
"It's a Hebrew name!" (I grew up with this understanding, so this was normal.)

"It's an Arabic name. So you are Muslim?"

"It is an Egyptian name. It is the name of one of our stars, so means 'stars.'"

And my personal favorite, at the cartouche place where I was commissioning my name on a cartouche:
"You are spelling it wrong!"

Knowing all this, we now come to Sariah's crossing the border back into Israel from Egypt:

At Israeli customs, the lady looks down at my passport and says, "What is your name?"
"Sariah," I say.
"What does it mean?" she asks, still looking at my passport.
"Um, princess?" I waver. (I decided to omit the "...of the Lord" part of that and also the Arabic concept of stars. These were Israelis, after all.)
"In what language?"
"Hebrew!" I knew this one.
She looked at me with a suspicious and an I-speak-Hebrew-you-fool look, and took my passport and went away. I was looking around with some apprehension at this point; the other customs lady was letting everyone through. Soon my lady returned with another woman, handed her my passport and spoke to her rapidly in Hebrew. This lady nodded, and beckoned me aside.
"What is your name?" she asked.
"Sariah," I said.
"What is your father's name?" she asked, still looking at my passport.
"Um, Michael?" I tried. She stared at me. Quickly I added, "Michael Robert Cottrell," and just barely remembered not to say "Ma'am!" at the end.
"Where was he born?" she asked.
"Washington. Washington state," I clarified. (Sorry if this is wrong, Papi, I was under duress!
"And your mother's name?" she demanded.
(Is all this written in my passport?, I wondered.)
"Jennie Lynn Salisbury," I announced.
"And she was born?"
"Utah - no, Colorado, no- UTAH." I was firm. (sorry if I'm wrong here too, Mom.)
And then the big question:
She asked, "What is your connection to Israel?"
What? Do I have one? Tourist? American? Mormon? Secret underground Palestinian terrorist?
I stared at her.
"Your name. What is your connection to Israel," she said, irritated.
"Oh, um, remember how in the Bible Sarai's name was changed to Sarah?" (I decided that perhaps the Book of Mormon concept was not the best approach.) "I think my parents just mixed those two names together." (I have NO idea where this came from.)
"Oh." She looked relieved and annoyed, and gave me back my passport, and off I went.