Almost Home - R2Iing from Southeast USA to Chennai

[formuser99]

Have been contemplating R2I to Chennai for quite sometime now. Thought I will start a diary to document my experience, and share it with the community.

[formuser99]

This forum has been very inspirational for me. I have learned quite a bit about R2I over the past few weeks by reading several diaries, forum topics. I think this is one of the most helpful communities around on the web.

I thought I will also start a diary to document my journey from the very beginning for several reasons.

a) Several people like poofy, plan2010, pazham have inspired me to do something useful with my time
b) I want to give back to this highly helpful, motivating and inspirational community. I hope my journey will help at least one another person who is considering R2I in future
c) I find writing this blog helps me to channelize my thoughts better. It also serves as a good stress reliever. R2I is an extremely stressful decision and migration process
d) When my kids grow up and start blaming me for the R2I decision, I want them to read this and understand that I have not made this decision lightly. I want to show them the reasons/thought process I have applied to the decision making process
e) Down the line, if going gets tough, I want to be able to go to a place to remind me of the journey to keep me motivated.

I hope to cover my entire R2I journey from the very beginning and hope to keep this blog live for several years to come.

Let the journey begin.

[formuser99]

Me: Been in USA for 16+ years. I went through the usual H1B-> GC -> USC -> OCI route.

Job: I am currently working as a Senior Technologist in one of the top financial entities. Have over 21 years experience in IT. I have worked on several cutting, bleeding edge technologies over the years. Pretty much done everything I wanted to accomplish technology wise.

Family: SAHM DW. 2 Kids 7th grade and 3rd grades

Environment: SFH, Mortgage, 2 cars and usual set of accessories

Hobbies: Gadgets, Photography, Building computers, constantly tinkering with computers, phones, tablets, Hollywood movies

[formuser99]

Back in 2009, after a gap of 3+ years, all of us went to Chennai for summer vacation. We stayed there for 4 weeks. I noticed several things initially.

a) We landed on an early Sunday morning in Chennai. As soon as i entered my house, two things hit me like a brick on the face.

- Dad has gotten older since I last saw him. He looked healthy but saw what years are doing to him
- A wave of nostalgia. Did not know till then how much I missed my house

b) Within couple of hours, my kids went downstairs to play with our tenant's kid. They soon met couple of more kids from the apartment complex next door. They made buddies fast and even started playing cricket. Even though neither of my kids speaks Tamil fluently, and their new found buddies' English were spotty, nobody seemed to mind that. They somehow communicated among themselves (with occasional adult translation help). For the next few hours, all I heard was laughter, noises of them running around, climbing on compound wall and jumping etc. They were very happy and that bought a smile to my face.

c) How much I missed sitting on the front steps of my house, reading Hindu with a coffee tumbler, listening to all the cacophony coming from the street. Even though I read the digital edition of the Hindu daily on my computer/tablet, it is no way near that experience

d) People on my street, who know me, saw me sitting on the steps, stopped by to say hello and chat. I noticed that they were very friendly and most importantly showed genuineness in their interactions. Not the polite hello, or nod or Hi I get on my street in USA.

e) Connected with 4 of my best friends within an hour after reaching home. They did not mind that I woke them up from their Sunday morning sleep. They were genuinely happy to chat with me and couple of them even stopped by within the hour to harass me. Felt really good to reconnect with my friends.

f) In laws stopped by and were very visibly and emotionally happy to see the grand kids

Man it is good to be home.

[formuser99]

The next 4 weeks were one of the best weeks of my life. I enjoyed being home, going shopping, eating in Saravana Bhavan, meeting relatives, watching TV and just plain relaxing without having to think about work, and other mundane activities back in USA.

Kids were having good time, playing all the time with their new friends. They enjoyed eating out. They were happy to ride in the front seats of the car (against my warnings).

DW was actively shopping every minute stores were open.

We had a family occasion where I got to meet lots of relatives after a long time. I saw several new faces in my extended family. Noticed that we are missing few people and others are not getting any younger. I met few nieces, nephews, aunts and uncles for the first time. We have a large family on my Dad’s side. I have over 20 first cousins and about 60 cousins once removed. Caught up with all the gossips I have missed.

Overall it was a merry feeling all around.

While enjoying the family and friends, I also observed several things about the environment itself. The average income level has gone up and so are the expenses. Cell phones have become common place item. Traffic has gotten worse and number of cars on road has gone up. None of the major problems have been solved and few of them actually gotten worse. Yet people seem to be generally happy. They were shopping, eating out, going on vacations and outings. The middle class seemed to have moved up a notch.

One day, I had a long chat with my brother, about his business, cost of living, IT salaries etc. Few things jumped at me from that conversation.

a) Change in IT salary ranges since I left the country (even after factoring inflation rate)
b) How my brother has grown up professionally and financially over the last few years. His ability to lead a comfortable life including a car, maid, 2 kids in good school with a non-IT and self-employed salary.
c) Interest rates in banks (Fixed Deposits) were about 8.5% which was considered a good return. Even after factoring the inflation increase, I felt the ROI is better than what I would get in a comparable investment in USA.

I started making some mental calculations about how much I could earn if I come back, my liquidity, my savings in USD etc. Suddenly I felt that economically it may be advantageous for me to work in India for few years.

My kids were only in 5th and 1st grade at that time and I felt that it may be easier for them to switch now. This will give them enough time to settle down before they need to get ready for high school. This will also give me a great opportunity to spend time with my dad. Finally I can also build that house I have been dreaming of.

One day I casually floated the idea to my family. I asked the kids, ‘do you guys want to live here and go to school’. The younger one looked at the older one and the older one shrugged his shoulders and said ‘I don’t care’. The younger one repeated 'I don't care'. DW gave me the ‘look’, but finally said ‘I am ok if that is what you want’.

Suddenly R2I seemed to be a viable, valid and happy outcome.

I boarded the plane back to USA with R2I seed firmly planted in my head and heart.

[poofygoogle]

Nice diary...

Esp. like the words " None of the major problems have been solved and few of them actually gotten worse. Yet people seem to be generally happy." and "Even though I read the digital edition of the Hindu daily on my computer/tablet, it is no way near that experience"..

Good luck and wishes for your R2i.

[formuser99]

Thanks poofy. I really appreciate your contributions and help to this forum members. At some point I want to PM you to get some feedback on couple of things.

[intellirun]

Great going mate !

Seems I will (although I could say I am already :confused:) be in a similar boat in few years time. Perhaps I can look at some of these posts for inspiration.

Good luck with your decision making. :thup:

[formuser99]

Since I have been working in the same company for about 14 years, I did not have the need to update my resume in a long time. To kick start my R2I efforts, I decided to first create a resume. Luckily my present employer has a career development center. Worked with them and created a decent profile of myself in the next few weeks. Sent it to my brother, couple of friends and also posted it on naukri, monster India websites. I also subscribed to job posting alerts on these websites.

Then the wait began….

Over the next few months nothing really happened. Daily job posting alerts would show up in my email box. Most of them did not meet my criteria. On an average, I would apply for 1 or 2 jobs a week. Almost all of my applications went into a black hole somewhere. Only very few first contacts were made during this period. Occasionally I would get an email here or a phone call there, but no follow-ups, no interviews or anything of that sort. I know it will be a slow process, so I shrugged it off and went on with my regular life.

Fall and winter came and went. Early signs of 2010 spring season started showing up around the neighborhood. I got busy with office work and project work. The R2I thoughts stopped visiting me regularly and moved to a much lesser frequency. Life fell back to usual routine.

The in spring 2010, an otherwise routine event, rekindled my R2I flame big time.

[rainbow2011]

Great diary formuser99. Waiting to read more......................................