DEBRIEF NOTES
DALJIT SHOKUR
NHSI C2A Development Programme, July 2011
Story of self
FRAMING
We are now going to hear Daljit Shokur’s Story of Self. Daljit works for the NHSI and
prepared this Story of Self for a training just like this one that was held in July 2011.
As you will see, Daljit builds to a short Story of Now and makes an ‘ask’ of the people
she is speaking to.
As you watch to Daljit’s Story of Self listen especially for the challenges, the choices
and the outcomes and note any particularly images that caught your attention and
the values that they reveal. Why do you think Daljit chose to tell this particular Story
of Self? There is a worksheet on page ## in your workbook to help you.
CHALLENGES, CHOICES & OUTCOMES

Her father’s challenge to secure a good job in Delhi and her parents’ choice to
leave India to come to England “in the hope of making a good life better”. What
values does this choice reveal? Hope? Hope in what? That ‘a world far away
from their own and people different from themselves’ would be welcoming? What
is the outcome of that choice? That Daljit is here today. What is the moral of that
story? Perhaps that having a hopeful belief and taking a risk can lead to a better
life.

The challenge faced by ‘anxious relatives’ as they received their ‘brown
envelopes.’ Her family’s choice to welcome them and to help. What values does
this choice reveal? Care? Helping those in need? Supporting your community?
What was the outcome of this choice? People received the help they needed and
Daljit’s family in turn we helped when they needed it. What is the moral of this
story? Perhaps that communities that support each other can thrive?

The challenge faced by Daljit of ‘living in two worlds’. What choice did she make?
To join in with British Bulldog and to jump into skipping songs. What was the
outcome? Daljit felt ‘the warmth of inclusion amidst difference’. And the moral?
That ‘differences are not a barrier unless we make them so.’
LINKING SELF & US & NOW

When does Daljit move into her mini Story of Now? When she says: ‘in the NHS
we are made up of lots of different cultures each with its own riches’.

What action was Daljit asking the people in the room to join her in? Jumping in to
the ‘culture beyond the NHS that have a lot to offer’.
RELEVANCE OF THE STORY OF SELF

Why do you think Daljit chose to tell this particular Story of Self? Why was it
relevant for her Story of Now? How? Her ‘now’ required people to: experience
new cultures, to take risks, to seek to improve the NHS from ‘good to better’ in
the hope of feeling what Daljit felt when she jumped into that skipping rope.
These were all things that Daljit had prefigured in her Story of Self.

Daljit’s stories were not randomly chosen – they were intentional. She chose
stories from her own life that demonstrated why she was asking us to take this
action – but which also gave us hope that by doing so we could experience
something be.
TELLING DETAILS

Note that Daljit doesn’t just say ‘they left with what they could carry in a suitcase’
– she makes it real for us with some telling details: ‘faded photographs, and linen
that was hand embroidered by my mother who had learned the craft from her
mother.’ In just a few words Daljit not only takes us into that experience of
leaving India but also gives us a sense of all that was being left behind.

‘Clutching brown envelopes’ – note how visual this is: Daljit could have said that
they came ‘for help reading letters from the doctor’.

‘pig tails’, ‘blue and brown school uniform from my Roman Catholic primary
school’, ‘read yet another Famous Five book’ – why are these details relevant?
They show (not tell) us Daljit living in two worlds.