Wel­come to my new “How To… Canada” series! In this series, I’ll try to put my knowl­edge to good use and shed some light on my new coun­try: Canada. You will learn how some immi­gra­tion tips and tricks, how to improve your pro­fi­ciency in both offi­cial lan­guages, how to find a job, how to set­tle in Canada etc. I’ll pub­lish a new “How To… Canada” post every Saturday.

To con­clude this series, I’d like to share with you some online resources about Canada. Canada at your fin­ger­tips, with­out the cold and the wind­chill!

The Media: TV, news­pa­pers and mag­a­zines

• Cana­dian Broad­cast­ing Cor­po­ra­tion (CBC)
• You can also browse the list of Cana­dian chan­nels (with info on each channel)
• The Globe and Mail
• National Post
• Le Devoir (in French)
• Toronto Star
• Each city also has sev­eral local news­pa­pers, such as the Ottawa Cit­i­zen, Le Jour­nal de Mon­tréal, Cal­gary Her­ald etc. You can find all the local news­pa­pers in this list.
• L’actualité (in French)
• Adbusters
• Maclean’s
• Chate­laine

Immi­grate to Canada

• The Min­istry of Cit­i­zen­ship & Immi­gra­tion is the only offi­cial immi­gra­tion resource. You may down­load your visa appli­ca­tions here.
• Immi­gra­tion Québec: if you wish to visit, study or set­tle in Québec, you may use the provin­cial government’s website.
• Loon­lounge offers com­mu­nity sup­port to future immi­grants. I’m an “expert” on this forum, designed to answer any ques­tion you may have regard­ing vis­it­ing, study­ing or set­tling in Canada.
• The Expat Forum is also a great resource to share tips about Canada.

The Cana­dian Blogosphere

• A New Life In Canada, by Aiglee: a cou­ple from Venezuela set­tles in Toronto. Aiglee blogs in Eng­lish and in Span­ish about her new life up North.
• Johnada (+ wife and new­born Esme) is from the USA and now lives in Toronto. Watch for his Moslon rat­ing system!
• Although not an immi­grant (well, she is from Van­cou­ver!) , Gail is a tal­ented pho­tog­ra­pher who shares snap­shots of Toronto, where she lives, and the world in general.
• On the other side of the coun­try, Expat Trav­eler, orig­i­nally from Switzer­land, blogs about her life in Vancouver.
• The Prairie Road is the story of an Amer­i­can fam­ily who moved in a small town, in Saskatchewan.
• Los Zieglers In Canada is the story of a fam­ily of 6 (well, 5 + the dog) from Argentina who moved to Ottawa. The blog, writ­ten by Guillermo, is in Span­ish, but full of tips and fun sto­ries. Guillermo speaks Eng­lish flu­ently so don’t be scared to com­ment in this lan­guage (like myself, when I’m lazy!).

Misc. Resources

• Tax Cal­cu­la­tor: for all provinces
• Art and Cul­ture in Canada: lit­er­a­ture, mag­a­zines, museum etc.
• The sym­bols of Canada: the flag and the national anthem, along with expla­na­tions and a bit of history.
• TSN: sports from a Cana­dian per­spec­tive (yes, it fea­tures hockey and curling!)

I hope you enjoyed this “How to… Canada” series. If you have more ques­tions about my new coun­try, please, don’t hes­i­tate to con­tact me!