I had my Oath Ceremony through the Scarborough office today and it all went very expeditiously. I made the mistake of not connecting the zoom audio at first, but that was the only real hiccup.
During the registration I had to confirm my name, show a piece of ID (Driver's Licence) and my PR Card. I was then told it would take 2-4 weeks to receive my Certificate. I asked about urgent processing and the agent (who was lovely) said that I would have had to request urgent processing before the ceremony date with evidence of the need. It wasn't very clear in the instructions that this was an option - I have (flexible) travel booked soon so I would have been able to share the evidence but the instructions seemed to imply that I would have to delay my ceremony. I didn't want to postpone becoming a citizen so I will deal with the travel issue later if it becomes a problem.
I was told that as long as I could send the oath form in right after the ceremony, the agent would make every effort to process it today to have it mailed out tomorrow. I then proceeded to cut up my PR Card. True to the promise I received email confirmation directly from the agent that everything was set to go and the certificate will be mailed tomorrow. I don't think this is standard procedure but I really appreciate the extra effort.
The ceremony itself was presided over by Judge Rania Sfeir who joined from Montréal. Though the language of the ceremony was stated to be bilingual, only Judge Sfeir spoke French - all instructions by the Clerk were in English. The mood and tone of the ceremony was happy and upbeat. Lots of congratulatory remarks and comments on the rights and responsibilities of Citizenship. There was a photo moment after the oath where we were all asked to turn off our video and the judge was the only one on screen, we could then take a selfie with Judge Sfeir. I regret not screenshotting the Judge and then using the image later on to take better photos. Tip: Take a full screen screenshot and then you can do better photos afterwards.
The instructions on signing the Oath form were given through a Power Point presentation and deviated somewhat from the instructions in the invitation with regard to the subject line of the email we had to send. There were 105 candidates so I appreciate we didn't have to break out into separate rooms to be given individual instructions.
Now I get to wait for the Certificate and go and apply for a passport. Here's my timeline to date:
Paper Application | Single | 1100.5 physical presence days
Delivered: June 3, 2021
AOR: Sep 15, 2021
eCAS in Process: October 29, 2021
Background Check Completed: Jan 24, 2022
Test Invitation Received: Mar 12, 2022
Test Taken: Mar 18, 2022
Test Marked Completed: Mar 21, 2022
eCAS Decision Made: May 19, 2022
Citizenship Ceremony In Progress: May 19, 2022
Oath Date: June 14, 2022
I am now a Canadian Citizen - hard to believe.