R2I: The first month (or so)

If you were smart enough to divide and conquer by having one spouse go back first and set up, or lucky enough to have someone in India to set you up, then this post is not for you :-). We decided that since we had a choice of two houses to go back to (both our parents live in Pune), we would wing it and decide what to do once we were actually in India. In hindsight this was a smarter decision for us since it had been four long years since our last visit and we had added a family member since then.

We decided to move in with his parents for the first couple of weeks (not my ideal way of returning … fortunately, I really like my in-laws) and then I went to stay with my parents. This helped us all acclimatize without any pressure and  turned out to be a boon in several respects.  The most important advantage was that our toddler had familiar faces around her while we were running around buying stuff to replace what we had given away. Secondly, because we were living at houses that were all set-up, we had access to the Internet so we could do any research we wanted (as long it was available). Lastly, living again with the parents lit a fire under our behinds since we both found it difficult to live in what had essentially become someone else’s house with someone else’s rules.

In the first month we had looked at rentals through 99acres.com and magicbricks.com and many other such sites that you can easily find with a google search and finalized a place we liked. We had cellphones. We had a zippy new automatic car. We had all the major appliances like the fridge, microwave, gas range, washing machine and water purifier figured out. We had basic furniture like beds, cupboards and a dining table ordered. We had bank accounts updated, debit cards renewed, gas connections (for a gas cylinder) applied for and we were also EXHAUSTED! But all that running about paid off because we were able to move into our own place within a month and a week from landing in India.

Each of these purchasing decisions has a story behind it which will come in a future post or posts soon. For now, just thinking about that first month has got me exhausted all over again!