India, July 3 -- It took quite a few failed dreams, says Haroon Siddiqui, before he hit upon the right one.

He failed at medical and engineering entrance tests; attempted to build a career in cricket. He knew he could write, so he turned to journalism at the age of 23, joining the news agency Press Trust of India in 1963.

Then he lost his father, took on the family's construction business and realised it wasn't for him. Restless and eager to be part of the wider world, Siddiqui moved to Canada in 1967. He was 25. He secured a job at the Brandon Sun in picturesque Manitoba, and reported on local elections in small towns where children stared because they had never seen a non-White person.

In this world, Siddiqui, with all that the name ...