R2I 2025 April

[wd40]

Hi All,

How are you doing? So finally I have set my R2I date to April 2025.

Triggers:
1) I just cant take any more orders from my manager. He is not rude per se, but it is me who is just fedup of listening to anybody, maybe it is my age, my ego. I like to do things my own style rather than taking orders from someone.
2) My networth has hit 10.7Cr. I am age 45, if I cannot retire with this networth then what is the point? I am never going to retire/R2I
3) My daughter is now in 7th std in Singapore CBSE school. We have this window of opportunity to spend next 5 years of her schooling in India, she gels into the Indian education system and then starts college in India, it is like the perfect branch out from India to Onsite and merge back to India, without much conflicts(Git lingo ). In 5 years my daughter pretty much forgets her Singapore life.
4) To spend some time with my parents, in laws, while they are alive. Again this is a small window of opportunity, we go back now, it is as if minimal impact, we came to Singapore 15 years back as a couple newly married and now we go back with 1 daughter 13 years old, it take a bit of setting up of a new place etc, but still we can keep visiting our parents place, relatives place and setup some roots and links. If we miss this opportunity and move after like another 5 years, it is likely many people have passed away and it wont be the same.

So those are my reasons. I plan to move to north Bangalore, where my parents live and either rent or buy a 3 bedroom house and put my daughter in a CBSE school. It is sad that due to NEP, kannada is compulsory now. So although we put so much effort and made sure our daughter learns Hindi in Cbse school in Singapore, the challenge of language remains.

Anyways, my wife and daughter are onboard and we have also started researching some schools in North Bangalore, Yelahanka, Jakkur area. Not keen on fancy intl schools full of OCIs. Would prefer a school with resident Indians/kids who dont look down upon India and dont have a backup plan with US passport to get back as soon as they finish 12th std.

So thats my update. I really wish the old forum was back or if we could somehow migrate the posts from there, so much of our history was there

[punjabi]

All the best WD40 with your move. India is a growing economy and you will do well.

[wd40]

There is a slight twist in the plot. I spent couple of days thinking about how my daughter will cope up with Kannada as 3rd or 2nd language. I considered we should teach her Kannada or send her to international school etc. But then I said chuck it! What is the point of my daughter studying in CBSE school and learning Hindi right from 1st standard? The whole reason was that we could smoothly transition back to India. If she is subjected to the regional chauvinism of kannada mathadu etc which ironically we are from Karnataka but our mother tongue is Konkani and I never studied Kannada and during my schooling we travelled all over India, but thanks to CBSE, we didnt face any problems. My wife is Kannada medium and fluent in it. But still the burden is not worth it.

So next my question was which other state which doesnt have a regional language and is nearest to Bangalore.
Answer: Madhya Pradesh and city Indore and voila!

This actually ticks a lot of boxes, the cost of living in Indore is low.
The city is clean and safe.
I dont plan to work anyways, so there is no need for me to live in Bangalore.
We also get to explore and live in a new city in India. We have mostly lived in South India. Living in a Hindi belt city would be a great experience for us.

Only drawback is that we will still be far from our friends and family.
We dont know anybody in Indore.

But then again, Indore is in our own country right? I considered so many retirement destinations like Malaysia, Bali, Thailand, Europe etc and the hoops we need to jump to get their retirement visa, show the funds and then also we are not allowed to work. There are Americans who just pack their backs and come to Bali and then live there. So we can do that in our own country shouldnt be difficult right?

I have my Indian passport and Aadhaar card, I should make the best use of it and go and live in the city which gives me the maximum bang for my buck.

So Indore it is. I just called my father and explained to him and he is supportive of my decision, although he said 45 is too early to retire.

I feel sorry for Bangalore. This is the place I call home and I associate myself the most to it and it is the place I spent most of my life. Unfortunately whatever the cosmopolitaness of Bangalore actually is; it doesnt work for us. Add to that the traffic chaos and the lack of infrastructure, water problems etc it doesnt excite us anymore.

[RBee]

All the best wd40 but you had such plans in the past too.
Reminds me of my plans in 2011 when I was in my 30s and my kids were still 12 and 10. Both of them now have completed Masters and are working . And I now at 47 still dream of retiring in India LOL But I sincerely hope that your plans succeed. Wish you the best.

[wd40]

All the best wd40 but you had such plans in the past too.
Reminds me of my plans in 2011 when I was in my 30s and my kids were still 12 and 10. Both of them now have completed Masters and are working . And I now at 47 still dream of retiring in India LOL But I sincerely hope that your plans succeed. Wish you the best.

Thanks Well my original plan was Mar 2024. We should have moved back this year, but we are extending it by 1 more year. But this time we are firm. In my case, I am not a high achiever, I am slacker. So for me making the decision is relatively easier than for most people who are obsessed about their title in their company and their position. I on the other hand have always taken confort with my networth and my plan was to always retire early. But I was trying to push myself as much as I can. Now I think I have reached my potential. This is not to say, I will never work again. I will move back to India, settledown and then see what interests me. I will spend a lot of time travelling and exploring and if I get bored I will get back to working.

[punjabi]

We can always dream. When i was 35 i dreamt of retiring at 40 , when it passed , I dreamt of retiring at 50 and now I dream of retiring at 60.
Now for the retirement destination ? Thats a tough one to chose. India/Europe/UK/South east asia ?
If in india where ? as there are literally a dozen good places. I think inretirement most important consideration should be access to good medical services , not too bad weather and good social life. There are good gated apartment complexes with great social life, i think that will be my choice when my time comes to retire.

[mcr]

There is a slight twist in the plot. I spent couple of days thinking about how my daughter will cope up with Kannada as 3rd or 2nd language. I considered we should teach her Kannada or send her to international school etc. But then I said chuck it! What is the point of my daughter studying in CBSE school and learning Hindi right from 1st standard? The whole reason was that we could smoothly transition back to India. If she is subjected to the regional chauvinism of kannada mathadu etc which ironically we are from Karnataka but our mother tongue is Konkani and I never studied Kannada and during my schooling we travelled all over India, but thanks to CBSE, we didnt face any problems. My wife is Kannada medium and fluent in it. But still the burden is not worth it.

So next my question was which other state which doesnt have a regional language and is nearest to Bangalore.
Answer: Madhya Pradesh and city Indore and voila!

So you decided to R2I to Bangalore, fixed a time frame, narrowed down the locations etc. and suddenly you change plans and decide to move to Indore and that too just because of Kannada

If you are making this change just because of your daughter's Kannada subject, I think you are overreacting. When I R2Id many years back my son did not know any Kannada and we put him to CBSE and found a tutor who came to our house couple of days a week and he was all set. He finished engineering last year and is now working in a one of the MNCs. My daughter is in CBSE 11th grade now and she is not an expert in reading and writing Kannada either (she speaks fluently), but she managed Kannada subjects without any problem. Since you mentioned in your post that one of the reasons for your R2I is to stay close with family and relatives, it makes sense to R2I to Bangalore. Since you are going to retire , you don't have to deal with the dreaded traffic or other infra problems anyways. There are some very nice apartment communities in north bangalore and you can enjoy a peaceful and almost first world life there!

[ballare]

Good luck with your move wd40. But is Indore comparable to Bangalore? There are many comparable cities like Pune that have Hindi as first language and might have similar ecosystem to Bangalore. I agree though having to deal with learning Kannada might be frustrating for your daughter along with all the adjustment. Other option for you to send her to international school or central school or stay back in Singapore till she finishes High School. I changed school in 8th grade and had to take Hindi as first language, till then had Hindi as second language and regional language as first. Just changing from 2nd to 1st language was such a big deal. I was a topper in the class till then, and the language change did set me back and couldn't put me at the top even though technically I was managing. Glad though I could learn both languages.

[wd40]

Hi All,

Sorry for the overreaction over the weekend. I was really pissed off with this Kannada imposition, the fact that we made our daughter study in CBSE school in Singapore and with Hindi from 1st std onwards and if all that effort of her study of Hindi for 7 years goes to naught and she has to learn Kannada that kills me from within. For her moving to India itself is a big set back at this age, on top of that if I have to subject her to another language, just imagine. In fact she herself told me "Daddy, lets go to somewhere where there is no Kannara(thats her pronounciation I dont want to study kannara" This is when my daddy instincts kicked in and I said, to hell with it, I will choose a state which has only Hindi and nobody can impose their regional language on us.

I did some googling and found articles from almost all south indian states imposing their language
kannada: https://www.deccanherald.com/india/karn ... ge-3085314

Marathi: https://indianexpress.com/article/citie ... x-6438088/

I dont want to paste article from other Southern states, you guys know it well.

But then today, weekday, I called up 1 school in Bangalore: New Horizon International school and they have hybrid cbse and cambridge curriculum:
https://newhorizoninternationalschool.in/

The lady at the other end assured me that they have French as 3rd language and Hindi as 2nd language and they are not implementing the compulsory 2nd language Kannada for the students above 6th std. Her words were "Yes sir, how can we force 8th standards kids to learn kannada all of sudden, so we are letting them study French, it is only the 1st std onwards kids who will learn Kannada"

The school fees is 2.5L ballpark which is okay for me.

Then I called Vibgyor CBSE school in Yelahanka and they said kannada 2nd language is compulsory and they will help etc. Then I asked them how about Vibgyor in Marathahalli whcih is cambridge and the person said in Cambridge they have only 1 2nd language either hindi or french. The fees for this school is 2.9L.

So that was really a sigh of relief, I am now okay to go for these hybrid cbse/cambridge type international schools as long as the fees are <3.5L a year. My impression was international schools are 5L+ which I am reluctant.

So all good guys Anyways, leaving Singapore next year is confirmed. We will definitely move to India, Bangalore advantage is there are good job opportunities if I want to get back to employment. I will probably take a break and settledown and then learn some cloud, python etc and see if I can get wfh type of jobs. I am not going to aim for the 40L - 50L kind of salaries. I am not going to work for money. It will be for the passion and interest and timepass. Money is great byproduct.

I will keep updating this thread with my progress.

Thanks for all your support

[RBee]

I know that it was over-reaction by choosing to go to Indore, MP

BLR is good but the ITPL park/Marthahalli etc are very polluted (I travel atleast once a year to BLR due to my mother).
Nice inside a gated community but once you leave that, the area is really bad as far as air quality/mosquitoes concerned.

Compared to BLR, I preferred Mumbai as I stayed in Mumbai for a week to meet my DH’s relatives.