A couple of bus stops down Via Cassia, I spot Christina, waiting to board. She's tall, has intense blue eyes, and a thick mane of curly blonde hair. Complete with her tight, brown-leather pants, she looks quite striking. 
Excited, I think, Now I’ll have someone to sit with and talk to during my long commute to Centro di Roma.
Like most of my coworkers at the American Business School, Christina grew up in Rome. She's Italo-Americano, with an Italian father and an American mother. We are both in our early 20s, and she’s the first sort-of American I’ve met in Rome besides Mrs. Latini.
As she nears me on her walk down the bus aisle, I say "hello," loud and clear. She does not respond, however. She instead strolls past me, head held high and eyes focused away, deliberately pretending not to hear me or to see me.
Slighted, I figure that here in public she wants to be all-Italian. Speaking English with an American like me would reveal her American identity. And apparently, this does not fit her desired image.
The other typing teachers at the American Business School on Via XX Settembre - Joe, Daniela, Louise, and Christina - are all highly fluent in English, some native speakers even. I am so happy to have found this linguistic sanctuary for myself.
On our half-hour lunch break, we gather around a table in the classroom where Mrs. Latini teaches shorthand. I’m looking forward to getting to know everyone, as I open my bag lunch and pull out my yogurt and plastic spoon.
Italian swiftly dominates the conversation, though, with just a few shreds of English. I experience that familiar left-out feeling. Even here I'm the foreigner - an Italian straniera rather than a Persian gharibeh.
With the isolation of being “there but not there,” I respectfully excuse myself, doing my cheerful best to mask my injured feelings.
With her honey-brown eyes full of concern, Daniela asks, “Where are you going?”
Hesitantly, I put it out there: “Well you guys speak Italian, and I don’t understand well enough, so I’m just going to read my book.”
“Come back, come back,” Daniela says. “We’ll only speak English from now on!”
I rejoin them at our teacher table. Christina seems bothered. And it isn’t long before Italian rules again.
