FORMER Kirkburton woman Josephine Blaney has written a book about volunteering in India and Pakistan.
It all began in Huddersfield where her father was a dentist. He used to treat children at an orphanage in India and the young Josephine Scholes volunteered there for six months.
She continued her voluntary work across the UK in places such as old people’s homes and a Jewish settlement in Glasgow.
Josephine went on to receive a diploma in social work and study social anthropology at Manchester University.
From 1977 to 1981, Josephine travelled India and Pakistan, sometimes stopping for a couple of days, sometimes for months.
She had no intention of writing a book. “I had a notebook I carried with me” she explains, “I only made a note if someone said something interesting.
“I remember one time somebody asked me ‘when are you going to become a saint?’”
Her travels took her through Pakistan and she spent a year in the seaport city of Karachi, working for a time in a pharmacy, before heading by train into India, where she visited many villages.
Travelling alone for the most part, she met people from all walks of life as well as in two countries, giving her the framework for her account and its title – Crossing Frontiers.
Josephine recalls coming home as a ‘culture shock’. “My father said I had an Indian accent!”
After a few years, Josephine managed to settle down in Hebden Bridge but added: “I still feel like Huddersfield is my proper home”.
It took four years before she found her notes and started rewriting them.
Josephine’s book ‘Crossing Frontiers’ is available now. It is published by York Publishing Services Ltd.
