4 ms·

There will always be subjective differences between India and the USA and not everything is hunky dory, but there are some things India is IMO better than USA f

There will always be subjective differences between India and the USA and not everything is hunky dory, but there are some things India is IMO better than USA for an Indian expat: 1. Climate: India is definitely sunny and enjoys predictable weather patterns all year round. Climate change might upset the equation, but it is still bright and sunny. 2. Biodiversity: India is 7th largest country with lots of great places to visit. Mountains, deserts, beaches, jungles, plains etc are all there and South East Asia and Africa are just a flight away. India is 2nd only to Africa when it comes to wildlife. 3. Food: Most Indians eat locally grown stuff sourced from the region and there is an amazing variety of fruits and vegetables that are local to the regions. 4. Social support: The society is definitely more warm and cordial compared to USA. There is house help readily available and the extended family support is unbeatable. 5. Booming tech scene: India will soon need to support it's own internal market which is growing exponentially. The success of Byju's DarwinBox etc is just a start. P.S. Balaji Srinivasan goes into details about ascending vs descending societies here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlY8HICFiRs&t=4183s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlY8HICFiRs&t=4183s

srvmshr 5y ago
Except 4 & 5, the first few cannot be said "subjectively better". This is your personal opinion, not the "statistically true" opinion. >Climate Definitely hotter in most (80%) of India, from late February to mid-October. US states enjoys more cloudless sunny weather per annum. >Biodiversity: India is 7th largest country with lots of great places to visit. Mountains, deserts, beaches, jungles, plains [...] US is almost a continent. It has all these and more. Sorry. > Food: Most Indians eat locally grown stuff sourced from the region True for US too. California, Midwest, Florida and North Carolina produce majority of US food primary produce. Infact, they export it. And we import a lot of these to India.
- hinoki 5y ago
  I’ll have to nitpick your last point. Unless you’re going to a farmer’s market, the quality of fruit and vegetables in America is abysmal. Watery hard fruit, etc. You can get the same terrible strawberries all year round if you want though. I’ve never been to India, but I assume the situation is better, at least based on how people rave about mangoes.
  - kortilla 5y ago
    So go to a farmers market or a coop. That’s a non-issue for people who care about fruit ripeness at pick time.
  - unmole 5y ago
    > I’ve never been to India, but I assume the situation is better It isn't. The best produce in India ends up getting exported.
  - renewiltord 5y ago
    Fruit in the tropics is unbelievably different from anything you can find in California. You can end up paying Erewhon and higher prices in the US and not getting close to the cheap tropical fruit in India. It’s a choice, though. Sushi is not as well available. European food is rare. Beef is not as good in India. If you’ve got cosmopolitan sensibilities you will find that there are trade-offs. For some reason, people get very attached to food so these comments get very contentious. But a fresh ripe banganapallee is not something you’re really going to experience in America. It is just absent. And if you live in India only, you will never get to experience top quality BBQ. This is reality.
  - srvmshr 5y ago
    Its a hit or miss in India. It isn't that the quality is vastly superior. You still get a produce from far away - and the fish is usually delivered on ice slab. The soil isn't that arable as you might expect, as the biggest chunk is loamy & alluvial soil of North India is exclusively wheat & sugarcane. Monsanto despite all its evils does a good job in Midwest. No similar equivalent in India unfortunately. Plus mechanisation rate is low because of land fragmentation. These are collective factors that make yield (qual + quant) a variable thing. My dad grew his own vegetables. The only guaranteed fresh ones I ate :) Fun fact: Best mangoes generally are from Philippines. The Cebuano variety. Alfonso is mighty overrated.
- FlyingSnake 5y ago
  > US is almost a continent. Sorry. This is a parochial dismissal of a valid point. India is also a sub-continent with some unique geography. > It has all these and more. Come back when the US has Himalaya, Wildlife like tigers, lions, rhinos, snow leopards, Elephants, Gaurs, Nilgai, Dholes etc. As someone who has lived in both India and the US, I can say that they both havr beautiful nature.
  - srvmshr 5y ago
    > This is a parochial dismissal [..] No. It isn't. Compare the landmass size & it explains what I mean. Compare the number of unique wildlife species & recognized biodiversity exclusive zones - and it shows the stark difference. Reserved & National parks cover far greater chunk of both US & CAN as compared to India, with the possible exclusion of some African countries (by %landmass coverage) >Come back when the US has Himalaya, Wildlife like tigers, lions, rhinos, snow leopards, Elephants, Gaurs, Nilgai, Dholes etc. N. America has Rockies & Appalachia - wild boars, bisons & reindeers & similarly exotic flora and fauna. I personally like rattlesnakes, gophers & opposums. Somewhat exclusive to US SW. What's your point, except sounding mildly absurd. > As someone who has lived in both India and the US, I can say that they both havr beautiful nature As someone who lived between India, US, EU & Japan for practically all my life continually after high school, I must better qualify to give a reasoned opinion based on your logic, no? Counting number of years in a country is meaningless to discuss, if your only jaunt is a weekend hike somewhere. I work for a biodiversity conservation agency additional to my CS job. Its a serious job done gratis in cooperation with Greenpeace. How about you? I can tell unequivocally that conservation efforts are very slim in India. If you seek an answer, choose any hill station & observe the deforestation around it. India claims recently green cover increased. Thats factually incorrect because they count shrubbery as green patches. What matters is contiguous forest which is fast disappearing in Southern Himalayas, Nilgiris and even remote places like Sunderbans & NE hills. The proliferation of waste & solid pollutants in green cover is a much more complex topic which would entail its own thread. Summarily NPS in US is still doing a better conservation as compared to Indian counterparts, although not on a vastly larger budget (i.e order of magnitude larger, as anyone would normally expect) I base my answer on stats not personal opinion. Just a last nitpick - you have misquoted me. I wrote "US is almost a continent. It has all these and more. Sorry." Your cherry pick "US is almost a continent. Sorry" made it sound more dismissive.
NovemberWhiskey 5y ago
>There is house help readily available There is house help readily available in the U.S. - the caveat is that you can't afford it unless you're super-wealthy relative to the average population. Incidentally, that's the same in India.
- pritambarhate 5y ago
  > Incidentally, that's the same in India. In India anyone earning Rs. 75K a month, (around 1K USD) can easily afford house help for cleaning dishes, and sweeping floor and cooking food. My personal expenses on these 3 things are Rs. 7500 per month (around $100).

srvmshr 5y ago

Except 4 & 5, the first few cannot be said "subjectively better". This is your personal opinion, not the "statistically true" opinion. >Climate Definitely hotter in most (80%) of India, from late February to mid-October. US states enjoys more cloudless sunny weather per annum. >Biodiversity: India is 7th largest country with lots of great places to visit. Mountains, deserts, beaches, jungles, plains [...] US is almost a continent. It has all these and more. Sorry. > Food: Most Indians eat locally grown stuff sourced from the region True for US too. California, Midwest, Florida and North Carolina produce majority of US food primary produce. Infact, they export it. And we import a lot of these to India.

hinoki 5y ago
I’ll have to nitpick your last point. Unless you’re going to a farmer’s market, the quality of fruit and vegetables in America is abysmal. Watery hard fruit, etc. You can get the same terrible strawberries all year round if you want though. I’ve never been to India, but I assume the situation is better, at least based on how people rave about mangoes.
- kortilla 5y ago
  So go to a farmers market or a coop. That’s a non-issue for people who care about fruit ripeness at pick time.
- unmole 5y ago
  > I’ve never been to India, but I assume the situation is better It isn't. The best produce in India ends up getting exported.
- renewiltord 5y ago
  Fruit in the tropics is unbelievably different from anything you can find in California. You can end up paying Erewhon and higher prices in the US and not getting close to the cheap tropical fruit in India. It’s a choice, though. Sushi is not as well available. European food is rare. Beef is not as good in India. If you’ve got cosmopolitan sensibilities you will find that there are trade-offs. For some reason, people get very attached to food so these comments get very contentious. But a fresh ripe banganapallee is not something you’re really going to experience in America. It is just absent. And if you live in India only, you will never get to experience top quality BBQ. This is reality.
- srvmshr 5y ago
  Its a hit or miss in India. It isn't that the quality is vastly superior. You still get a produce from far away - and the fish is usually delivered on ice slab. The soil isn't that arable as you might expect, as the biggest chunk is loamy & alluvial soil of North India is exclusively wheat & sugarcane. Monsanto despite all its evils does a good job in Midwest. No similar equivalent in India unfortunately. Plus mechanisation rate is low because of land fragmentation. These are collective factors that make yield (qual + quant) a variable thing. My dad grew his own vegetables. The only guaranteed fresh ones I ate :) Fun fact: Best mangoes generally are from Philippines. The Cebuano variety. Alfonso is mighty overrated.
FlyingSnake 5y ago
> US is almost a continent. Sorry. This is a parochial dismissal of a valid point. India is also a sub-continent with some unique geography. > It has all these and more. Come back when the US has Himalaya, Wildlife like tigers, lions, rhinos, snow leopards, Elephants, Gaurs, Nilgai, Dholes etc. As someone who has lived in both India and the US, I can say that they both havr beautiful nature.
- srvmshr 5y ago
  > This is a parochial dismissal [..] No. It isn't. Compare the landmass size & it explains what I mean. Compare the number of unique wildlife species & recognized biodiversity exclusive zones - and it shows the stark difference. Reserved & National parks cover far greater chunk of both US & CAN as compared to India, with the possible exclusion of some African countries (by %landmass coverage) >Come back when the US has Himalaya, Wildlife like tigers, lions, rhinos, snow leopards, Elephants, Gaurs, Nilgai, Dholes etc. N. America has Rockies & Appalachia - wild boars, bisons & reindeers & similarly exotic flora and fauna. I personally like rattlesnakes, gophers & opposums. Somewhat exclusive to US SW. What's your point, except sounding mildly absurd. > As someone who has lived in both India and the US, I can say that they both havr beautiful nature As someone who lived between India, US, EU & Japan for practically all my life continually after high school, I must better qualify to give a reasoned opinion based on your logic, no? Counting number of years in a country is meaningless to discuss, if your only jaunt is a weekend hike somewhere. I work for a biodiversity conservation agency additional to my CS job. Its a serious job done gratis in cooperation with Greenpeace. How about you? I can tell unequivocally that conservation efforts are very slim in India. If you seek an answer, choose any hill station & observe the deforestation around it. India claims recently green cover increased. Thats factually incorrect because they count shrubbery as green patches. What matters is contiguous forest which is fast disappearing in Southern Himalayas, Nilgiris and even remote places like Sunderbans & NE hills. The proliferation of waste & solid pollutants in green cover is a much more complex topic which would entail its own thread. Summarily NPS in US is still doing a better conservation as compared to Indian counterparts, although not on a vastly larger budget (i.e order of magnitude larger, as anyone would normally expect) I base my answer on stats not personal opinion. Just a last nitpick - you have misquoted me. I wrote "US is almost a continent. It has all these and more. Sorry." Your cherry pick "US is almost a continent. Sorry" made it sound more dismissive.

NovemberWhiskey 5y ago

>There is house help readily available There is house help readily available in the U.S. - the caveat is that you can't afford it unless you're super-wealthy relative to the average population. Incidentally, that's the same in India.

pritambarhate 5y ago
> Incidentally, that's the same in India. In India anyone earning Rs. 75K a month, (around 1K USD) can easily afford house help for cleaning dishes, and sweeping floor and cooking food. My personal expenses on these 3 things are Rs. 7500 per month (around $100).