invisible

An older fisherman's wife was selling fish on one of the sidewalks leading down to the waterfront. My wife, who was Korean and spoke no Japanese, would tell me what she wanted in English. I would translate to Japanese, telling the fish lady what we wanted. The old woman refused to acknowledge that a white guy was bartering with her, and talked directly to my wife in Japanese. Back and forth it went, sort of in a circle, old woman to wife, translation from me to wife, wife back to me in English, and me in Japanese back to the old woman. We finished our transaction, we got our fish, and the fisherman's wife never once looked at me. It was like I was invisible...