Thursday, June 14, 2012

Reflecting - a year of R2I ...

As I mentioned in the previous post, with a year of R2I completed, thought this will be a good time to reflect about the ups and downs of R2I. One plain and simple feedback - it has been a busy and non-stop activities year!. Not a year, in fact, two + years - since the R2I work starts much before you land in India. The prep work itself easily takes a year or so and keeps you busy as well. It has been so busy, when I was in US I didn't miss a year of tax filing deadline but this year had to take the automatic 2 months extension for US residents staying abroad. Thank you IRS for providing that option!

In summary, with all of the +ve and -ve things, overall feeling is that it was a right decision to move back and no regrets. As all R2Is do, we have tried to isolate ourselves from the ugly parts but that can go only so far and knowinglny or unknowingly, we get indigenized.

Reflecting on some of the good, bad and ugly things after a year of R2I ...

Good parts:
Closeness to family: This is a huge +. Unlike before where you were practically 'written off' from day to day happenings here, now you are part of the conversations(good or bad) and that feels great. First year has been busy to get completely involved but hope that will change as we settle down more & more.

Kids exposure to family circle: That is happening more and more and kids are getting to understand how much family is there around them. It was funny to hear my first kids feedback when somebody asked him how does he feel here - 'too much family'!! It has been a mental exercise for them to get exposed to so many family members and trying to remember who-is-who.

Indian food, access to things Indian etc: In Bay Area, it was relatively easy to get access to these things. However, not as easy as going to Big Bazzar here or Total where you can buy things Indian fresh.

Feeling of 'I am at home': You don't feel that you are in a place far from 'home' and in a place that doesn't belong to you. I think in countries like US, job pressure has enormously increased and there is a constant fear of loosing the job and how do you survice without a job. Versus, here you know that you can easily keep things going even without a job. Fortunately, the Job market in IT has stayed strong so far and hopefully that will continue. 

Health: I had heard lots of feedback about people getting sick. But, fortunately I think we have survived that part so far. I think some of the precautions we took helped - we avoided drinking water outside (even if the source is told to be 'filter' water). We restrict the food consumption to certain places and stay away from 'street side' variety or even the middle class places. 

Bad parts:
Bad roads: Just by keeping the roads in good shape, some of the traffic congestion can be easily addressed. But, the governing system worries more about building big fly-overs and not keeping the roads sane. If you don't have familiarity with certain areas, it is quite challending to drive there, especially during night - there will be unmarked humps, huge potholes etc.

Traffic congestion: Getting to work is a hassle - you have start early and leave early as well. Depending on where you stay, you will need to set aside 1 to 2 hours for commute, which is a waste of time. You get used to it but fact is this won't change anytime soon either.

Dust, smoke, lack of clean air: You get exposed to good amount of dust since there is the non-stop construction activity. And, the dug-up roads which turn muddy. You can isolate a bit by having a/c in the car while driving etc but you will have some exposure. It was good to see that the level of vehile smoke has come down, in-fact. Most of cars are newer and the unleaded petrol has helped. Autos, trucks and buses are still the polluting culprits. 


Dealing with anything 'government': Moved to a new place and only option for internet wsa BSNL. Needless to say they suck at getting you a new connection - it took a good month of following up/shouting before the connection was made availalbe. And, this is with the feedback that BSNL is 'fine' for getting internet. 

Ugly parts:
Overall cleanliness and hygene in the surroundings: Indian homes are sparkling clean when it comes to inside but outside you see a pile of rubbish. We have sparkling,tidy apartments but the access roads are so bad they can't be called roads. Can't the builder invest a bit more money and get the road fixed? They can but there is no profit in that for him. It is strange that people don't realize the value (or they do realize but just don't care) of keeping the surroundigs clean. But, not very surprising since our mentality is - only worry about things which have direct impact on you. Inside the home belongs to you but not the outside. Don't see any change happening in this department anytime soon. 

Lack of footpaths: Where there are footpaths, people do use them. But, unfortunaltey, you can hardly find them! There is space left for footpaths but either occupied by shop owners or with weeds and large holes. If the footpaths are made available, the roads can be fully utilized by vehicles and that would help ease the congestion a bit but it is still a 'rocket science' that they have to be made available. 

It is interesting for me to go back and read my own reflections which I jotted down after 4 months of R2I. 
http://r2idiaries.blogspot.in/2011/10/overall-feeling-after-4-months-of-r2i.html
Surprisingly, they have relatively stayed the same! Was talking to a collegue of mine - they are here after 5-5 of R2I and said they started enjoying their stay after 3-4 years! We have ways to go to get there ...