No Longer NRI: How I Left America for My Homeland: Degrees of Freedom, #1

By Ranjani Rao

Ranjani Rao moved to the United States as a new bride. Over the course of fourteen years, she acquired a PhD and a green card, became a working woman, and a mother. But, somewhere along the way, home beckoned. After much reflection, Rao and her family moved back to India. This essay collection chronicles her journey through her reflections as she contemplates the move during her last few months in America and ruminates on her life as a newly returned NRI. The book covers a range of experiences and is a thought-provoking meditation on the meaning of "home." 

Given the globalized times in which we live, many of us cycle through various stages of resettlement. Sometimes we are expats, other times we are immigrants/emigrants, and often we are something in between. These essays speak to the adventure as well as the nostalgia that are the constants of this life on the move. This book of essays is a valuable addition to the library of every person who straddles two worlds that are familiar but that tug in different directions.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Story Artisan Press
• Release date: Mar 8, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393762386

Book preview

No Longer NRI

How I Left America

for My Homeland

Ranjani Rao

No Longer NRI Copyright © 2019 by Ranjani Rao. All Rights Reserved.

Cover Design by Anuradha Vajjala

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review. 

Ranjani Rao

Visit my website at www.storyartisan.com 

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First Printing: March 2019

Story Artisan Press 

CONTENTS

Prologue

X+1 Syndrome

Curvature

Last Bag of Rice

Back Home

A Child’s View

At Work

Defining Family

Indian Standard Time

Essentials of Life

DCBA: Desis Who Came Back from America

Why Are You Here?

India Advantage

Epilogue

Prologue

I left India as a diffident young bride, apprehensive about leaving behind all that was familiar, but eager to embark on a new phase of life. The news of my whirlwind arranged marriage followed by my departure for America had been met with unstinted support and approval by my large circle of family and friends.

Over the course of the fourteen years I lived abroad, I acquired many skills, earned a doctorate, and became a mother. I became equally comfortable in both India and the U.S., effortlessly switching between cruising on American freeways and bargaining with street vendors on my annual visits to Bombay.

My decision to return to India in 2003 was not received with the whole-hearted endorsement that I had expected. Instead, it sparked many discussions, debates, and disagreements within and beyond my circles in both countries. A few people even observed the irony that my situation was similar to the return of Lord Rama after fourteen years in exile. However, unlike Rama who had been banished, I had left voluntarily.

The decision to return, however, was taken after much soul-searching. Even so, neither the parting nor the settling down were easy. As Khalil Gibran said so eloquently in The Prophet,

It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear with my own hands.

The essays that you are about to read were published between December 2003 and November 2004 in the California-based magazine, India Currents. They comprised a monthly column titled Round Trip and are a record of my thoughts and reflections at the time. They are about leaving a familiar foreign country and returning to a country, that was ostensibly my own, but to which I was returning as a virtual stranger.

I received many positive comments and emails after each essay was  published. Many readers wrote to say that my experiences had helped clarify their thinking and that it had facilitated honest discussions about the ramifications of returning to India.

I hope you find these chronicles of a returned Non-Resident Indian (NRI) interesting and helpful, whether you are within or outside your home country and whether or not you are considering a move. After all, every life is a journey, regardless of whether you stay in one place, live like a global nomad, or end up being something in between.

X+1 Syndrome

One popular urban legend that is familiar to the Indian immigrant community deals with the so-called x= x+1 syndrome. This equation is a mathematical representation of the dilemma faced by the well-established Indian immigrant (typically a male) who embraced America and its values in his youth and prospered in ways that eluded his peers who remained in India.

For such an individual, the early years are euphoric as they are spent pursuing professional success and material wealth. But, as mid-life looms, the person feels a little less certain and a little more lonesome. He starts to experience conflicting emotions. On one hand is the reality of his well-constructed American life. On the