Answer upfront – yes, it was worth it. Had I stayed in India, I would have hated my life, the country, my forced marriage, my bank balance and my neighbours. I would hate my life and be frustrated constantly. Instead, I live a comfortable life, love my wife and would trade none of this in a trice.
I am Indian. When I was fifteen years old, like most Indian students, I was asked to pick a career. How you can do that at fifteen years old is still beyond me. At the time, I did have access to the internet and I had access to some information about how one does this. What I did not have was wisdom and experience. Neither my own nor borrowed. I did not have extended family members who were doctors, engineers, lawyers, artists or among the myriad careers one can choose at fifteen years old. I did not even know that I was good at maths or science. I am still above average at both. I was asked to make this choice, while sitting in Bahrain, and while knowing that my family was about to move to the great nation of India, a place where humanity and humans go to die.
Once I moved to India, I had to pick between three choices – science, commerce or arts. I was (and remain) quite bad at the arts and I did not like money so science it was. Eventually, I ended up in engineering college. I hated india when I was ten years old and at fifteen, that did not change. I still dislike India to this day although I have softened my opinion of those less fortunate than me. I despise the Indian state, the Indian way of thinking and the general ethos of life there, the idea that things won’t get better so why even bother? I was determined to make a better life for myself and I knew that moving to the West was the path to that better life. I resolved to live a better life and to be a better person. Unfortunately, once again, I had no source of direct information or experience and so turned to my old friend, the internet for answers. I also did not have enough money in the bank so I went to work, at one organisation named Lhussen and Bhutto (unlikely to be Larsen and Toubro).
My escape route was the same one use by approximately 1.3 million Indians in 2023 – education. I went abroad to get an education. This meant picking from two options yet again – follow the herd to the anglophone countries or aim for somewhere else. “Somewhere else” spanned Venezuela (yes, that Venezuela), Turkey, The Caribbean, Austria (not Australia), Kyrgystan and my eventual destination of Finland. Finland was so unheard of that my mom called a priest to bless me before I departed and that man had never heard of Finland. Oh well.
I will skip the details here as that’s not the point. My aim here is to tell you whether it was worth it. When your savings are in the shitcoin called the Indian Rupee, studying abroad is perilous. Your savings are meagre and do not get you far. Information is also difficult to find. Most Indians make a beeline for the USA, the UK, Canada, Australia or New Zealand. English is the reason why, however, all these countries charge international students fees. Astronomical fees, if you are Indian. The fees at a decent US public university were comparable to the total worth of my parent’s real estate portfolio. The solution is to borrow money from an Indian bank and to hope that the stars align for you. In the case of the USA, that means finding a decent university, completing your course, finding a job, and staying legally long enough that you earn enough to pay back your loan. This was too much risk for me so I dropped that option entirely. Canada is a smaller market with similar costs so that was out as well. Same for the UK and Australia.
At the time (2013), most universities in the Schengen area (continental Europe) did not charge tuition fees. Living expenses were the only cost, but even those were significant when you factored in the exchange rate. Anyhow, I decided what I wanted to study and then trawled various internet forums and university websites. I took notes, estimated expenses and looked at the job market via job sites. Eventually, I found my way into a few universities. TU Eindhoven was one but the Netherlands charged tuition fees. Not astronomical but significant. That was not an option. FH Aachen (not RWTH) also wanted me but I did not want them. Finally, I selected TKK – Teknillinen korkeakoulu – now christened Aalto University, in Espoo, Finland.
No tuition fees but it was in a corner of Europe, closer to St Petersburg than to Berlin and separated from the mainland by the Baltic Sea. Living expenses in the Nordic countries are also high relative to the rest of Europe. The job prospects were also bleak, especially since the Finnish language is difficult to learn. No matter, I decided to take the risk and to book my tickets on Turkish Airlines. Away we went!
Two years later, I was pantti hunting (yes, pantti, Finland’s bottle deposit system) and applying for jobs, desperate to extend my study permit by another year. Persistence paid off and I found a job in the Netherlands and started making a life for myself. Things were looking up. At this point, I could have stayed in the Netherlands. I was on the path to learning Dutch, integrating into Dutch society and eating cheese. As life would have it, I found love in a Canadian woman and this compelled me to move to Canada. Once again, I faced the struggle of finding a job, building a network and starting over, in yet another country. It all worked out in the end.
Was this worth it? Absolutely. I would not have it any other way. Yes, there was tremendous risk here. Moving to a fragmented continent where I did not know the local language, and where I had neither contacts nor familiarity with the region are all risks, huge risks even. Living in the cold for a man who grew up in the desert, another risk and challenge. The worst case was returning to Bharat (the transition started in 2014) with a degree from a university that no one recognised and convincing employers that I was employable. I was not in financial ruin so that was a plus. I have friends who could not find jobs in the US after spending lavishly on degrees. That is arguably worse – paying off US fees in rupees.
There was the risk of not finding a job after my master’s degree. I could have continued on to a PhD but i viewed the opportunity cost as too great. In fact, today, I earn as much as my colleagues with PhDs but I have the advantage of more work experience and more money in the bank. I did have a few offers to start a PhD but I declined them all. That was my option of last resort, the one I would take if I chose to stay in Europe and wanted to earn a small amount of money. Then was the frugal Indian mentality and living with the knowledge that my bank balance was only going down. This led to some questionable decisions like skipping meals and buying almost stale vegetables. I vividly remember calling the HR person at the Netherlands-based company where I eventually worked and noticing that it was an international call, hence it was expensive. In hindsight, that was the best two Euros I spent because it got me a job. None of the other candidates called, only I did.
On top of all this was the racism, the risk that my ethnicity carried a level of stigma and assumptions, many justified, some not. The pressure to apply for jobs across Europe, not wanting to limit myself to one country or region. The political uncertainty that came with Brexit and the Syrian refugee crisis of 2015. The hate against immigrants (I was never an expat, that’s a white people thing), the costs and challenges of true integration.
I could go on.
Was it a lot? Yes. Was it all risky? Yes. Was it scary? Yes.
Was it worth it? Absolutely.