This paper is an attempt to reconstruct how C.V. Raman, a peripheral scientist in the early 20th century colonial India, managed to develop a research programme in physical optics from his remote colonial location. His attempts at self-training and self-education eventually led him to the discovery of the Raman Effect and to the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1930. In trying to re-construct an account of the ways in which Raman developed his research programme in optics by grasping various elements of a scientific practice from the Western scientific community, we see how a newcomer in science could be surprisingly creative in achieving new breakthroughs, and how through such efforts he or she can establish new trading zones with another established community that has the potential to develop into independent practices.