“Scusi...posso avere un altro coke?”

I stammered out this phrase in ugly, broken Italian to the waitress at our table. This was the first night of a three-week study abroad trip through Italy. I studied Italian previously and even lived in the country for a year during high school, so I felt the pressure that night to impress my peers with my foreign language skills. It seemed that the waitress could detect my fear of speaking Italian as she continued staring at me with a blank face.

“Uh...un altro?” I said while pointing to the Coke bottle. She continued to stare, and I thought to myself, what is her problem?! People around me watched inquisitively, but she did not seem to understand what I was trying to say. A million thoughts raced through my head: These are the correct words, right? I couldn’t have forgotten that much in a few years! Has the language changed? It felt like forever while I decided my next move. The waitress started slowly shaking her head. Did she not understand? My worst fear was coming true. I could not determine if my spoken Italian was simply incomprehensible or if she was playing a really well-timed joke on me.