This essay uses storytelling as a mode of inquiry to explore how students with languages other than English and with diasporic experiences and identities negotiate a pathway for themselves in a relentlessly Anglophone environment. I share a story that provides a small window into the everyday work of an English teacher in a large, linguistically diverse school with a large Muslim community on the outskirts of Melbourne. I explore the contexts in which they work and the challenges of representing the affective and ethical dimension of English teachers' work. I reflect on my own situatedness as a researcher and how the methodological and theoretical choices I make are influenced by who I am and how I see the world. This reflexivity helps me understand why I see what I see as a researcher.