The narrative presents sixty years of Kailashs life. Her memories of childhood in West Punjab evoke rural customs and religious practices consistent with recent scholarship on Punjabi religion rather than with the currently dominant Sikh discourse of a religion sharply distinguished from Hindu society. Her marriage, as a shy 15-year-old, with no knowledge of English, to a scientist, Gopal Puri, brought ever-widening horizons as husband and wife moved from India to London, and later to West Africa, before returning to the UK in 1966. This life experience, and Gopals constant encouragement, brought confidence to write and publish numerous stories and articles. Kailash writes of the contrasting experiences of life as an Indian in the UK of the 1940s and the 1960s. She points up differences between her own outlook and the life-world of the post-war community of Sikhs from East Punjab now living in the West.
