I know exactly what you mean about going on this journey with the people here. I've been trying to move to Canada for many years, some years more seriously than others. But since I've found the people on this forum it's like I now have people to share that excitement with. People to encourage me when I'm down. People who understand why we would put ourselves, and our families, through such a test of endurance.
I've had a love affair with Canada since I first went there in 96 and I've been back lots of times for work since. But this pull to Canada is most definitely from me and not my wife. She is happy to go because she knows how much I want to live there and she and the kids have been there with me for a long period in 2013. She does really like it there, but it's my dream, not hers.
I know why I want to live there. There are plenty of pull factors and a few push factors from here. The weather - even the winters. The culture. The multicultural nature of the people. The employment prospects for my children. In the UK we are lucky in that we have a great education and health care system the same as Canada, but Canada doesn't have the same sectarianism as we have in Northern Ireland.
My wife keeps asking me for my number one reason why I want to move and leave the good life, nice house and well paid job I have here. It's really hard to put my finger on it, but I genuinely feel happier when I'm there. Maybe it's the bright blue skies - yes even in the winter. Maybe it's that I feel that the children will grow up with a brighter future there outside our sectarian country.
Can I ask others to tell me what's the number one reason why they want to move to Canada? Is anyone else having to convince their partners to make the move and if so what's their approach?
It´s way past midnight here, but I felt so familiarized with this post that I simply couldn´t wait to jump in.
We are in a very similar situation, my fiancée is not really that excited about moving to Canada, but she is on board pretty much because she understands how much I want it. She keeps saying that we don´t need to go to another country to have a prosperous life, and she is absolutely right.
My country is one of the most prosperous places in Latin America, people here don´t really emigrate in large percentages, in fact we get a lot of immigrants from our neighbors. We are not rich, but at the same time we are not as bad as other countries in our region.
When you tell someone that you intend to leave the country most of the time people will say things like this:
- "We are fine here, why do you want to leave?"
- "Are you unemployed or something? Can´t you find a job?"
- "We have a beautiful country, great weather, great people, you won´t find anything like this anywhere else."
- "Once you live overseas you´ll understand how great this country is"
- Etc, etc, etc...
Having said this, you might understand how lonely I feel when I say that I want to immigrate.
Just like Shaun, I have a very good life here. I live in a nice apartment, I have a nice car and a good job. In fact, just this past week I was offered a new position by one of our top bosses, apparently he liked the way I work so much that he wants me in his team. This new job will give me more visibility within the organization, will allow me to travel overseas frequently (something that I love) and will probably bring more money. I´m far from being rich, but I would say that I live better than 90% of the people in my country.
Despite all of the above, I still have a desire to leave.
The reasons are many:
- Yes, my country is safer than other places, but we still have high crime rates.
- Many people live in gated neighborhoods due to crime. Those who can´t afford living in gated neighborhoods need to keep their houses surrounded by bars, otherwise burglars would break into your house sooner or later. The scene of having most houses with bars is simply awful, it´s like living in jails.
- Don´t even think of walking around your neighborhood or city after 8 pm.
- We have a crumbling infrastructure.
- Public transport is terrible and it´s so easy to buy a car now that everyone owns one. The problem with this is that I said before, our infrastructure is so bad that our roads are the same as they were 40 years ago. As a result, we ended up having 50 times more cars with the same roads, which creates huge traffic jams. Many people easily spend 2 to 4 hours commuting everyday in distances not greater than 20 km.
- In order to get decent and not so expensive housing you would need to move far away to some almost rural areas. The closer you are from downtown the more you need to pay. Most of the time you spend a lot of money and the houses are not even that great.
Why Canada?
I´ll be honest, I grew up wanting to immigrate to the US, Canada did not come to mind until about a year ago. I´ve been to the States more than 20 times and know more than 30 states, east, west, south and north.
Every time I had to return to my country from the US I felt sad. Going from developed cities with great highways, great airports, etc to what we have was like going back in time. Given that immigration to the US is so hard now I gave up to the idea of living there.
Overstaying my visa and getting a job illegally crossed my mind a couple of times, but I wanted to do things legally. I could still apply for Permanent Residence through my sister-in-law, but it would take about 12 years to get it. At 35 this is simply not an option.
Then I heard about Canada Express Entry. Initially the CRS cut-offs were so high that I quickly dismissed the idea of applying. About 6 months later, at the beginning of this year, I surprisingly noticed that the calculation method had changed. I entered my data in the tool and voilà, it turned out that I was not that far from reaching an acceptable score. My postgraduate degree and years of experience helped me a lot and in some way compensate for the points I lose for age.
So, going back to the original question, why Canada? Well, Canada is very similar to the US in many subjects: language, city vibe, infrastructure, etc. In addition, it´s cleaner, people are friendlier, access to medical services is better, etc . I also want to live in a place where I know that winters are going to be cold and summers are going to be hot. A place where I can take a bus or a train, take out my laptop and not worry about something happening to me. A place where I can take a walk in the park at 9 at night without feeling insecure.
Many times, when I see people from very poor or war rotten countries trying to immigrate to Canada or other places and compare them to my situation I ask myself:
"Should I feel ungrateful to my country for wanting to live somewhere else despite all of the things I already have?"
"Is the rest of the people right when they say that we live fine here and that there is no reason to move?"
"What if I leave everything behind and then I regret it and can´t get back to where I was?"
Anyway, I feel I just got many of my feelings off my chest. It´s good to know I´m not the only one in this situation.
. But I ma sure Canada will give me this chance
