ABSTRACT
Why social work? My mum would have asked me that question had she not been too busy trying to whack me over the head, after I had told her that I wanted to become a social worker. To be fair, it must have been quite a shock for her (and I was to later discover, to most of my relatives) because becoming a social worker is not the sort of thing Sikhs do. For that is what I am: an unorthodox Sikh, but a Sikh nevertheless. Sikhs where I was brought up (Birmingham, England) generally become doctors, enter into business (which can mean anything from owning a local convenience store, to having the controlling interest in a multi-national), or become lawyers. That last profession was where I started out. I successfully passed a Law degree, and went back to law school to study for the Law Society finals. About half-way through, I realised that becoming a lawyer was a mistake for me. At first, the realisation expressed itself in a feeling that I could not find the words for. Much like getting a tune in your head and not knowing the lyrics, or indeed much of the tune itself. However, after a while I began to articulate to myself what that feeling was. I wondered if it was about being a lawyer; it struck me that a lot of them appeared to be two-dimensional. I had two nightmares that often turned into one. In the first, I was wearing a pin-striped suit, driving a Mercedes, drinking in wine bars and talking about obscure statutes. Then the nightmare would change to a different picture. This time I would be conducting an interview with a Sikh, only the Sikh would be speaking in Punjabi (my mother tongue) and I would ask for an interpreter. This, I felt, was not good.
