R2I and Dilemma

[wd40]

Appreciate your perspective here. Our thought process was multifold.
1. Our longer term goal is/was to settle down in India for good including kids settling down in India. That meant, they sit in IIT/NEET exams and do their undergrad from Indian school. Everything/everyone suggested CBSE for that goal.
2. We also wanted more assimilation into India for kids. IB and other international schools meant they would continue to live in their american bubble and not experience real India and indian people with it's good bad and ugly.
3. Considering transitioning is harder in higher grade and CBSE being easiest and IB being hardest, we thought of going easy on kids in initial year so that they get used to their new surroundings before getting creative around education.
4. We didn't have a crystal ball to anticipate how things will go.
5. CBSE being more prevalent, it would be easier to find other better CBSE school if we were to move cities/areas within major metros and country due to job and other scenarios.

Having said that. experience and hindsight is always 20/20.

Here a few mistakes you did:

1. There is no concept of good school. Some consider a school good if it has high percentage of NEET/JEE rankers(like Narayana, Sri Chaitanya). Some consider a school good if it is all fun and dance, low class strength etc like Euroschool, VIBGYOR etc

2. Also there is a bit of incoherence between your statements. Being fairly active in sports is fine in lower grades, but even schools like Euroschool have 5 activities from 6th to 8th std. Activities such as skating, karate, swimming, chess, guitar, drums etc. But even Euroschool, from 9th std have only 2 activities, the addmission coordinator told me this is because from 9th onwards studies become serious. You yourself said you want your kids to do NEET/JEE then this is what you should expect or rather your kids should expect, even from the most fun schools like EuroSchool. If you put in a traditional school then God help your American kids.

3. You should have planned this better, for US NRI kids, you must bring them to India are a fairly young age because the education system is completely different. You waited for too long to make the move. My daughter is 13 years old and she is in 7th Std in Singapore CBSE school. But already they treat exams with lots of seriousness. My daughter just finished her mid term exam and they have like 1 day holiday between each exam just for studying and they really study hard during those days. Rest of the school days they really chill. But even though my daughter likes sports, the school here in Singapore, doesnt have much facilities. But that is okay. she does skating on her own, she used to play a bit of badminton etc. But I feel sports is not that important especially after the kids start entering higher grade. These days anyways they are on their phones and tablets and they have a very strong friends circle in whatsapp groups and they all play Roblox.

[wd40]

Forget all the advice you get here telling that IB/International schooling in India is a good substitute for US schooling. Even a mediocre US public school with modest ratings blows out the best International schools in India. US public schools are amazing bang for buck. I'm starting to think even school shootings and fentanyl overdoses are worth the risk, compared to the "conditioning" your kids will be subject to in Indian schools.

In my view the educational institutions and even the best sports training facilities in India always overpromise and under deliver. You end up spending a lot of money and get very little in return.

Currently, we are in India (semi-R2I'ed) but will most likely move back early next year. Nostalgia can be very expensive and even worse - detrimental to young children. I'm glad we did this because it put an end to my R2I cravings for good.

Curious to hear what caused your semi-R2i to fail? Please tell us the whole story. How old are your kids, what was your main R2I driver? Hope it was not just Nostalgia, if so, then you are disappointed, because of your own doing not because India is bad or US is good.

You can then keep convincing yourself that US is better and India is bad, but that is just a coping mechanism, because you yourself call it semi-R2I and you were not fully committed to the decision. So dont blame India, blame yourself.

[loyalindian]

@Social,
My children are older now and are out of college. We considered r2i when they were in elementary school. The main obstacle was since the kids were born in the US they would eventually return to live in the US. Your children especially the older one is in high school and adjustment to the CBSE system and school social life is challenging
Fortunately our parents in India did not require full time support and I continue to visit them a few times every year.
From what I have heard the Indian college admission process is hyper competitive (even more than the US).
If your kids go to undergrad college in the US, it is an expensive proposition and requires your earnings to be in USD not INR.
I dont know your financial/work situation bit do consider returning to the US as soon as feasible

[worldoyster]

Here's my R2I story. I r2i'd this year from US to pune, India in June. daughter 14 and son 10, joined school in pune. They are not enjoying their life as initially expected since everything changed and they were not really on board when we decided to move. They were too happy with their life in America.

Indian schooling has been disappointing at best. We enrolled them in a good CBSE school and it is considered a good school in our community. Kids who always wanted to go to school and never missed a day of school in life, started hating their school when we moved to India. Another disappointment was around sports activities. Our kids have been fairly active in sports when they were in US and getting quality sports coaching has been a challenge both in school and outside.

We are seriously considering if we should move back just to get schooling done before doing another round of r2i after 8 years. Kids are US citizens if that matters. Want to understand from others what they went through when they moved and how did they deal with it?

You could still soften the blow by transferring them to International School rightaway without wasting any time. I don't think it would be fair asking your kids to prep for NEET/JEE, as this preparation needs rigorous study and they might curse you their whole life. If you want to make this a success, give them a similar environment as US in School. In my view CBSE is not the right answer given the age of your kids. If you had gathered information from actual folks who had R2ied with similar age kids, you might have never made this CBSE school decision.

Check the earlier forum for R2i diaries.

I imagine if we are forced to R2i, my first priority would be the well being of my kids' mental health. Wishing that you turn this R2i into a success story.

[Srini234]

Its all worth it (R2I ed in 2007, returned to US 2022). My kids were brought up in ICSE/CBSE school.

I think you are clear in your goals. Everything about india is awesome for us. I never wanted to come back to US - while we were in india we enjoyed every bit (social, emotional, physical proxomity, travel etc). Thats a way to live R2I.

When i came back to US, yes it did hit me that i do not have hour or cannot afford a house in US, or my daugther ended up doing UG in india, and i do not have 3x money than others.. I will have more -ve if we had stayed in US...

[desi4ever]

Its all worth it (R2I ed in 2007, returned to US 2022). My kids were brought up in ICSE/CBSE school.

I think you are clear in your goals. Everything about india is awesome for us. I never wanted to come back to US - while we were in india we enjoyed every bit (social, emotional, physical proxomity, travel etc). Thats a way to live R2I.

When i came back to US, yes it did hit me that i do not have hour or cannot afford a house in US, or my daugther ended up doing UG in india, and i do not have 3x money than others.. I will have more -ve if we had stayed in US...

Hey Srini, good to see you here. This R2I/R2A topic has kept the old forum going for many decades and will be a never ending topic with different perspectives of why R2I , why not LIA There is no definitive answer and having R2Id and R2Ad I'm at peace with myself in US. But I hear you and actually happy for you that you were able to pull off a long R2I than most.

[satish1961]

I always find it interesting when some one talks about "failure", if you return back to R2A after doing a stint at R2I. Once you stay in a foreign country for 6 years, you become global citizen. Anything after words, 6 month per year or India 2 years, US 2 years, whatever you and your family decides, is
your own, and no success/failure in any of them.

[Returning_Indian]

There is no failure. You move to find something better as obviously you are not content at your current situation. If a place where you move do not offer as per expectations than atleast you tried and you move on. But failure would be to live in regret of not trying. I like India much better after coming back second time. I appreciate the convenience in life so much more now than I did the first time when I returned. I shudder at the thought of having to do dishes, vaccum, toilet cleaning, making my bed etc. I absolutely hate grocery shopping and lifting those bags back to house and then rack them in pantry. Having to drive half hour in case you run out of milk. India offers life conveniences, especially as you grow older. You just have to have the ability of throwing money to solve problems. If you cannot take advantage of your wealth to make life convenient then it becomes difficult.
Going to west the first time as a student was awesome. Young energetic, whole life ahead of me, nothing I couldn't achieve. But going second time around to west was not as much fun as I thought it would be. I could not replicate my feelings from first time around. Reality of living western life as you grow older did hit hard. I was always comparing it to my India lifestyle. Why was I loading a dishwasher...so much more. But even with all this I have gained so much in experience.
I do plan to move back to US after few years to facilitate my son's education in school/college. And the fact that it's impossible to pay for US education with Indian income. But atleast this time around I know what I should expect when I go there.
It appears moving around keeps me happy. It does take away the potential savings and great career. But I do not feel bored in life.

There is only one life and it is not given to fill money in bank. It is to keep yourself and people around you happy.

[desi4ever]

There is no failure. You move to find something better as obviously you are not content at your current situation. If a place where you move do not offer as per expectations than atleast you tried and you move on. But failure would be to live in regret of not trying. I like India much better after coming back second time. I appreciate the convenience in life so much more now than I did the first time when I returned. I shudder at the thought of having to do dishes, vaccum, toilet cleaning, making my bed etc. I absolutely hate grocery shopping and lifting those bags back to house and then rack them in pantry. Having to drive half hour in case you run out of milk. India offers life conveniences, especially as you grow older. You just have to have the ability of throwing money to solve problems. If you cannot take advantage of your wealth to make life convenient then it becomes difficult.
Going to west the first time as a student was awesome. Young energetic, whole life ahead of me, nothing I couldn't achieve. But going second time around to west was not as much fun as I thought it would be. I could not replicate my feelings from first time around. Reality of living western life as you grow older did hit hard. I was always comparing it to my India lifestyle. Why was I loading a dishwasher...so much more. But even with all this I have gained so much in experience.
I do plan to move back to US after few years to facilitate my son's education in school/college. And the fact that it's impossible to pay for US education with Indian income. But atleast this time around I know what I should expect when I go there.
It appears moving around keeps me happy. It does take away the potential savings and great career. But I do not feel bored in life.

There is only one life and it is not given to fill money in bank. It is to keep yourself and people around you happy.

Although , I dont disagree with the points made in this post, its also prescriptive and a justification to R2I /R2A. Even Jeff Bezos said he loads the dishwasher himself ( I dont know how far its true ), but I'm so used to loading dishwasher that it does not feel like a chore anymore and even during our Airbnb vacations I enjoy loading the dishes . LIA keeps you on your toes, keeps your brain active if you are working and I see its very important to keep oneself engaged in some tasks . If you accumulated enough money here to FIRE, paycheck is like a bonus to keep your lifestyle while you watch your 401K grow ( or crash ) See even I'm justifying my LIA here. Point is we are all seeing through our lens projecting/justifying our actions and ideas about LIA, R2I, LIA. So no R2I R2A and LIA is not a failure in any means! Ultimately we need to be happy wherever we are. For most NRIs India will always be a place of comfort and peace( unless there are other factors like job stress, family dynamics ) Nothing wrong with that all.

[SAPPORO]

For first gen immigrants especially living in Indian enclaves (most are), success is dictated by savings mindset than convenience and they don't necessarily miss India. The second gen would happily order in food everyday not having to load dishwashers and/or get groceries and even razors delivered to the point of causing heartache to their parents that they decide to R2I since they can't take it anymore Heck- even I signed up for Walmart+ to get groceries delivered since my town's population almost doubles due to snowbirds from Oct to Apr.