In America, I have an “ethnic” face, a certain immigrant look that says, “I’m not Scandinavian.” When I lived in Abadan, my mother and I stood out because we looked foreign. Abadan’s desert climate, which resembles that of Palm Springs, produces olive-skinned inhabitants. My mother and I, because of her Turkish ancestry, possess a skin color that on Nicole Kidman is described as “porcelain” and on others as “fish-belly white.” In Abadan, people always asked my mother whether she was European. “Well,” she’d always gush, “my aunt lives in Germany.”

When we moved to California, we no longer looked foreign. With its large Mexican population, Whittier could have passed as our hometown. As long as we didn’t open our mouths, we looked as if we belonged. But just one of my mother’s signature rambling sentences without a verb (“Shop so good very happy at Sears”), and our cover was blown. Inevitably, people would ask us where we were from, but our answer didn’t really matter. One mention of our homeland and people would get that uncomfortable smile on their face that says, “How nice. Where the heck is that?”

In 1976, my father’s new job took us to Newport Beach, a coastal town where everyone is blond and sails. There, we stood out like a bunch of Middle Eastern immigrants in a town where everyone is blond and sails. People rarely asked us where we were from, because in Newport Beach, the rule of thumb was “If not blond, then Mexican.” People would ask me things like “Could you please tell Lupe that she doesn’t have to clean our house next week, since we’re going to be on vacation.”

One would think that the inhabitants of Newport Beach, a town two hours from the Mexican border, would speak at least a few words of Spanish. But in a place where one’s tan is a legitimate topic of conversation (“Is that from last weekend at the beach?” “No, I got this playing tennis yesterday”), learning the language of the domestic help is not a priority.

During my first year in Newport Beach, my junior high was conducting mandatory scoliosis checks. All the sixth-graders were herded into the gym where we waited for the nurses to check the curvature in our backs. When it came my turn, the nurse took a long look at my face and said, “Oh my God! Are you Alaskan?”

“No, I’m Iranian,” I replied.

“No way!” she shrieked. “Bernice, doesn’t this one look Alaskan?”

As Bernice waddled across the gym, I wanted to make her an offer. “How about I tell Lupe not to come next week since you’re going to be on vacation, and we just call it a day?”