Hi all CD's,
Just completed 4 years in India.
(Note : This thread is not about me as an individual but rather focuses on how I made India my Canada).
It was lucky that I went with a job offer in India. This made me settle down faster as my company paid for my flight tickets, container and 2 weeks in a 5 * hotel.
Lot of flats avaiable for rent. Choose a 3 bed portion for Rs 9000 a month. Advance 40 K.

School for my cousins was possible since we knew a contact. There are many private school chains like Champaka, international schools where admissions might have been easy. In regular schools, it generally is full unless you start from UKG. The advantage with regular schools is that the fees is low. Teaching is not that good. Home work is too much. You need to spend atleast 2 hours a day (but that is how we wanted). I am sure that we can also get by with no homework at all. Our cousins are generally toppers in the class. Malayalam was a problem but we made them go for tutions. Since Malayalam and Tamil are sister languages, we are coping up.

Getting a local address was a big thing. To buy a car we need an approved local address. So it was hard to buy a new car. We put off buying car for 3 months for that. I applied for driving license and showed my handwritten local address on the Canadian passport and they accepted that. Once I got the DL on a local address, then the rest was a breeze.

All things that you get in Canada, you can get it here. You can get mouth wash,
tim bits, McD, KFC, foreign cloths, Kraft Cheese etc here.

Savings is good here. Cost of living is very cheap. Getting loans is easy once you have 20% down. I still have not bought a flat since I am not sure where I will be in the future (mainly due to family problems). I am trying to book a house in chennai but it is damn expensive. Other option is a house in Coimbatore. At the city perifherey, I am getting a new house on 2.75 cents and with 2 small bedroom for Rs 23 lakhs. In Chennai, this will be a crore.

Public transport is good. Medical is good. We have a very big hospital where if you walk in, you will not know the difference between Canada and India and the room rent is just Rs. 800 per day. We had our cousins admitted for viral fever and dengue fever which costs Rs 14K for 4 days hospitalization (each time). Our company health insurance took care of it all. Had to pay Rs 3,000 from pocket for food alone.

Climate is hot and humid. You sweat a lot.

Work culture in India is good. Office is 6 days but you have the flexibility to work or not to work. I worked well for the first 2.5 years and then later due to family problems, was not able to work properly.

When my family problems was not there, I used to take bus / train to visit my home town of Trichy each saturday night. I used to use the toilet of the train and the take bath in the bus stand and then visit friends in Trichy (my hometown and college). Then I take the train back to Kerala on sunday night and reach home on monday morning at 7:00 am. Also I used to visit my parents once in 3 weeks or once a month for 1 day.

I never take leave. My office gives me 14 days leave in a year but I have not used it as work can come to me anytime.

Murali.

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I am a Gents and not a Ladies.

If you can rent for Rs. 9,000 a month , then NO point in buying a flat . You are better of investing that money..you will get a better return.

Even if you keep that money just in Fixed Deposit, you can get 10 % on it in India. Stocks will be more, if you invest properly.

Life is NOT that great & cheap in Metros like Delhi, Mumbai, Calcutta, Bangalore, Chennai etc. For Rs. 9,000 a month you won't even get an illegal slum/hut in these cities.

2-Tier & 3-Tier cities are probably the best to live in India. Job opportunities might be less & salary might be less in these cities, but the cost of living is much much lower & standard of living is better with less traffic, less pollution, less population etc.

In India just turn a blind eye towards the corruption & hooliganism and you will be fine. See no evil , hear no evil & speak no evil & you will be fine.

Corruption , Bribes etc are normal in India & they have a standrad fixed rate..so don't sweat it. Look at it as a form of tax . The taxes you pay in Canada is much much higher than the corruption/bribes in India ..so in Canada there is just legal corruption in the form of exhorbitant taxes , in India the taxes are much much lower, you just pay some bribe/corruption on top of it.

As far as heat is concerned in India, your body can handle heat better than extreme cold. I would rather take 35 C hot/humid , over - 20 C cold/dry .