Synopsis:
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Returned from Atlanta, Georgia after staying in US for 16+ years (in many places with final destination being Atlanta, Georgia).
Job:
Took internal job transfer with a much better roles and responsibilities compared to what I was doing in US, working for a MNC S/W product development company.
Family:
Family of 4 with wife and 2 kids, kinds 10 and 8 years old now, currently studying 6th and 3rd grades in a CBSE school (The Samhita Academy)
Reasons For Return:
Much better social life, sense of belonging being in India, be closer to ageing parents, kids to have good education and learn Indian Culture, better job prospects, closer to being with extended family and many more...
Place of Return:
Of course............. Bangalore, Karnataka
Status:
All of us US Citizens with OCI Card Holders.
Experiences so far:
Our experiences so far has been excellent, kids have settled quite well, wife is really enjoying every bit of her stay here in India, my office work is also great not much of pressure and I am able to manage the time quite well.
When we returned kids did not know ABC of Hindi but they have picked up quite well, I must say school teachers are very supportive towards this effort for my kids to learn Hindi, kudos to them.
We initially stayed in a rented house and waited to purchase a house here till our US house got sold, after selling our US house (for a loss :() we hunted for a house for ourselves in Bangalore and finally purchased an (already built) independent house/villa in a gated community. We never liked the apartments to purchase/live even though it has lot of amenities, we wanted a house of our own and also from cost perspective it worked out quite well. Will be moving to the new house shortly by end of this month! Kids are just eagerly waiting to move there :35:.
One of the pain point is the commute to office which takes quite long for me (morning 1 hr, evening 1.5 to 2 hrs) as I live in South Bangalore and my office is in East Bangalore - Whitefield. I don't drive car and use our office provided transportation/cab and it is working out quite well. The good part is that it has brought in discipline as there is a regular time I go to office and come back home. Since I don't drive it is stress free and also being environment conscious I feel happy to take office cab resulting in less consumption of petrol and not having my car contribute to the traffic congestion, I wish every one takes public transportation or office cab to help reduce traffic congestion and contribute to a cleaner environment for our future generation.
Weather wise Bangalore is a lovely city, the climate is simply superb! Though the city is growing but still there is lot of greenery and many parks inside the city.
Kids have accustomed to the Indian environment, their american accent is no more, found lot of local friends, enjoy cricket and other India games with their friends.
Wife started working in the same school as a music teacher (back in US she was working as IT professional), this is what she wanted to do as this is her passion/interest. Stress free work and enjoy a lot teaching little kids. A good work-life balance which is very much needed.
Never drove a Manual shift car in my life however after coming back to India purchased a new manual shift car (Maruthi SX4) and drove from dealer shop to my home, great experience.... many times the car stopped while changing gears but eventually reached home safely... Driven couple of times to Chennai, Coimbatore, Mysore during weekends and the experience driving on the highway has been excellent, NHAI roads are really excellent and on par with US highways (though you have to pay toll many times, but simply it is worth)
Customer services in private banks, telephone companies have improved a lot since i left Bangalore in 1993, lot of things can be done through online and mobile phone (for example train/bus/airline ticket bookings, bank transactions, gas booking, library books renewal etc... ) which a great boon to our country.
What I personally feel:
Though there are challenges with traffic, noise, pollution etc. and sometimes I do miss US, however when I see my wife and kids being very happy everyday here, their happiness takes precedence:thup: over my US thoughts.
Though my parents are not staying with us, I feel very happy that I am able to help them whenever they need with just a phone call. My parents are quite happy with our return as they feel more confidence that their son is near by and they get great opportunity to play and spend time with their grandsons.
From work perspective I feel great to share my experience to the young team and feel happy to see that they are benefiting from this. Lot more opportunity for me to work in this area and looking forward to it.
Tons and tons of choices for food, being a vegetarian it's great to be in a place like Bangalore where you have a great choice for South/North Indian food.
Compared to my professional life in US, here the work is less as I am in a management position, do have lot of interaction with US team however I am able to manage the timings quite well by setting expectations!
Jugaad systems works quite well here, the more you know people here the easier it is to get settled as one way or other people (neighbors, colleagues, friends) will come forward to help when in need. This has been a great experience for me. Like we have network of friends in IT industry so that it helps during your job search, the same applies to outside office as well, so it is good to have more friends and lot of things happens through mere contacts.
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So overall my R2I experience has been very great and positive and I am looking forward to a great life in my new home!