The bus sped off and I started to walk towards the nearest supermarket. When I picked up my pace, so did someone behind me. Weird. I thought I had been the only passenger to get off at this stop, which wasn’t really a stop but a random spot on the main street.
I glanced over my shoulder just to make sure I wasn’t in trouble—things can happen when you’re walking down a dark street in Brazil.
Not this time, though. It was just the harmless French dude who was on the bus with us. I had seen his République française passport an hour earlier, at the Argentinian border.
He caught up with me. “Excusez-moi, excusez-moi… vous êtes québécoise?”
Evidently, he had noticed my blue Canada passport too.
“Non, Française et Canadienne,” I replied without slowing down.
The subtle nuance escaped him.
“Super. Mind if I walk with you? I’m thinking of immigrating to Quebec and I have a few questions.”
I did mind. Not his company, but the questions. Frankly, I wasn’t in the mood for them. I had a supermarket to go to but mostly, we were in Brazil and I didn’t feel like talking about Canada—it was another world, another life.
“I live in Ontario, actually, so I’m not super knowledgeable about Quebec.”
He frowned and shrugged as if to say, “meh, that will do.”
“I’m aiming for Montreal.”
Right. Of course. Where else?
“I’m really sick of France. I’m looking for better opportunities, a more flexible job market… and none of that socialist crap. Too many people are abusing the system. French citizens want benefits but no responsibilities… bunch of entitled idiots… This country is going to shit! When did you leave France?”
“Huh… in 2001.”
“Well, it’s worst now, trust me. My parents rented one of their properties,” he went on. “The tenants didn’t pay rent for three months. And guess what? Can’t evict them because it’s winter. Ridiculous.”
“Right. Well, it’s—”
“Rewarding hard work. That’s what France should do.”
“And you think Canada will be a better fit for you?”
“Ah, oui! Now, when you come to Canada with a visa, do you get any kind of support from the government?”
I burst out laughing and abandoned him in front of the supermarket—well, that was the pot calling the kettle black!
My job was easy with the liberal and delusional French dude, he had just used me as a sounding board. But I never quite know what to say when someone expresses interest in immigrating to Canada and wants my feedback. As a Canadian, I will always say, “welcome!” I just can’t promise anyone their life will be better in Canada. No one can predict the future.
Every day, I receive two or three emails or comments from strangers asking me to map out their destinies. “I want to move to Canada, tell me how.” “I have a degree, can I work in Canada?” “I don’t have a job can I find one in Canada?” “I hate my life, will I be happier in Canada?”
Disturbingly specific or annoyingly general, these questions boil down to one major unknown—it is worth it to immigrate to Canada?
I have no idea. Is it worth it to get married? Is it worth it to have kids? Is it worth it to pursue XYZ career? Are we talking from a financial or a human perspective?
This is what I do know based on my limited experience as an immigrant to Canada.
If you manage to get permanent resident status, you will, at one point, have the opportunity to become a Canadian citizen. There are requirements to meet and paperwork to fill out but the process isn’t difficult nor complicated. However, I can’t promise you will feel Canadian or that a Canadian passport will change your life for the better.
Canadians usually have a fairly positive attitude towards newcomers. There are political arguments over immigration levels—do yourself a favour, don’t read The Sun’s reader comments section—but far-right parties are not as vocal as in Europe. Both Liberals and Conservatives are more likely to seek immigrants’ votes than to bash them. As long as you make reasonable attempts to blend in, you shouldn’t feel uncomfortable as an Indian-Canadian, a Chinese-Canadian, a Haitian-Canadian, etc. The concept of diversity isn’t new to Canadians. Racial slurs are strongly frowned upon and there are laws and systems to address discrimination.
You’re probably more likely to enjoy a certain level of material comfort and eventually own a car and a house than in many countries. The entire economy is based on consumerism—you will be introduced to credit cards, lines of credit and mortgages soon enough. Yet, like products, your life “won’t be exactly as shown”—it’s unlikely you will be able to afford a house downtown Toronto or Vancouver and life upgrades are expensive. That said, it’s not crazy to dream of a semi-detached in a suburb, somewhere in Canada.
I have no idea if you will be able to find a job in your field or if you will make more than your current salary. In the first few months or years, chances are you will work for minimum wage at one point, experience a round of layoffs, have less time off than before, find good opportunities and change job titles—and not necessarily in this order.
You will eventually build a network of acquaintances and coworkers but making real friends may turn out harder than expected.
You will adopt a few Canadian quirks and find many puzzling.
You will miss home at one point, even though you didn’t think it was possible.
You’ll gain a new perspective on your birth country and on the world.
Will you stay in Canada? I don’t know.
Will you live a better life? Some days yes, some days not.
Is it worth it? Who knows? I only live one life at a time—I have no idea how things would have turned out if I had stayed in France, if I had moved to China, if I had sailed around the world.
Here or there, write your story.
Looking back, I’ve come to realise that my life is more or less a chain of random decisions. I’ve been living in Germany for almost 6 years now, and that wasn’t a planned decision. Neither was my decision to spend 7 years in western NY to be in graduate school. Nor was my decision in 2001 to choose linguistics as my field of study in university. But one triggered the next, and the next. And as you said, you only live one life, so might as well make the best use of it. You can only plan as much, and I’d rather enjoy my life than take all the time to plan it.
I know some people really plan their life and it puzzles me. Plans never go according to plan… or it is me?! I like the idea of one event or one decision triggering the next, like you say.
Arrrglll, a future CAQ voter.
Il s’est vanté d’avoir voté Le Pen :-/
Oh putain… Ouais, ça explique. Ces gens ont un amour immense pour les systèmes autoritaires et dictatoriaux. Le Pen, Poutine, Trump, Erdogan, Duterte … C’est tous les mêmes.
Doit y’avoir une fêlure dans l’enfance.
Et par cela, je veux dire qu’ils ont été bercés trop près du mur…
Ce que je trouve choquant, c’est que le type a l’air de penser que l’on peut virer des locataires qui ne paient pendant l’hiver canadien. Peut-être que c’est possible, je ne sais pas, mais que ça ne lui pose pas de problème éthique ou moral est consternant.
Je sais, il était jute tellement suffisant… et jeune, en plus! Enfin la fin de la vingtaine je pense.
En fait, la discussion s’est arrêtée quand je lui ai dit : “bon, tu vois la gauche? Ben moi je suis à l’extrême.”
North America DOES NOT reward hard work. The “American Dream” is, indeed, a _DREAM_, something that doesn’t have any existence in reality. And let’s remember that the OECD rated France as one of the most, if not the most, productive country in the world, in front of the U.S.A.
If you think that you pay too much taxes and moochers abuses the system, bravo, you’re a libertarian asshole : your dream country is Somaliland, not Canada.
En fait, je me demande pourquoi en Europe, les gens aiment prendre en exemple le modèle américain. “Ah, oui les Américains font comme ça!” (prononcé d’un ton admiratif). Mais, les gars… vous avez l’impression que c’est une réussite, le modèle américain? Parce que franchement, moi non. Enfin si, y’a des gens très riches. On est vachement bien avancé.
Il y a une vidéo assez ancienne de Mélenchon qui discute avec des jeunes d’une quelconque école de commerce. Elle est assez marrante vu que quelques-uns vantent le système américain, et Mélenchon leur cloue le bec en citant les données de l’OCDE.
Autant je peux comprendre qu’on veuille étudier l’art de faire des affaires et le commerce, autant je trouve que la plupart des écoles de commerce en France sont d’un ridicule avec leur nom anglais à la con… genre la “international school of mega-business with super dollars of trifouillis-les-oies”.
Well said Juliette!
It is true what you have written; no one person can give a “sure” answer to anything, let alone “immigrating to Canada”.
That being said, your website gives a very good insight (might I add, a very accurate) into life in Ottawa, or stretch that to Ontario.
It is understandable that people are anxious of the unknown and have questions; but there is such a thing called “boundaries”, or “etiquette”, or “common sense”; one mustn’t ignore those, eh!? I know I wrote you many a questions too 🙂 I hope I didn’t piss you off back then, if I did, I am really sorry.
Alors, vous etes bien sure, que vous n’etes pas quebecoise? 🙂
Oh, monsieur, j’en suis certaine!
(Perfect grammar!)
You never bothered me with your questions because 1) they were good questions, i.e. you did your research beforehand 2) you were friendly and established a personal connection. I like chatting with people in general, but I’m human… I tend to be more helpful when the person starts a conversation rather than just expect me to do their homework 🙂
Well yeah, you gotta do your homework! I mean anyone really interested in moving to a different place gotta research, now it is easier than ever, no?
… you’d think so! And I give a pass for people who don’t speak English well or who are from countries in turmoil. But seriously, when an American asks me the most basic question about Canada, I’m like… ahem, dude, Google!
People are unbelievable!
I mean, the guy you met makes me angry.
And this makes me realise how clueless we were when we arrived here!
We asked questions to no one, we figured we would get the answers anyway 🙂
And I am happy it happened like that, because actually we were not expecting anything,
we were open to everything and that was a blessing.
Oh, I was clueless too! And it’s cool to ask questions, but I can’t be responsible for people’s happiness. I mean, it’s a bit of a tall order. You should see some of the emails I get… I’ll write about that.
I don’t like when people ask me this kind of questions – except friends of course – but I feel like it’s because of the “distance”. I mean, i made the choice to immigrate a long time ago. I’m not sure I want to think again of the way I lived it. It’s the same for pregnancy. I have zero interest on talking about pregnancy with a stranger. I don’t want to give my opinion or recommend something. I’m sure I will feel the same about toddlers or daycare as soon as it will be over for me.
It’s funny because I love sharing experiences but I hate giving my opinion when I feel the person is looking for guidance. Does it make sense? I like the “eh, I did that, cool you did that” but I won’t tell someone what to do. I can’t. I also refuse to manage people (which is also a reason why I took the freelance route).
Funny thing is, sometimes I’d love to talk about Canada to my close relatives… and absolutely no one ever expressed interest! 😆
Except, of course, the usual question called “what time is it for you?” 😉
Oh yes, classic! I think my parents more or less know the time difference now, but it took… years.
Hi Juliette
I wonder if you have missed something that feels important from where I’m positioned, perhaps the French guy in question wasn’t asking for information as he was looking for a few kind words of encouragement or someone offering him hope.
I can’t help but notice that you, somehow, pre-judged him for being French (being nosy about his passport).
Because that’s exactly what you did in this post https://correresmidestino.com/canadian-immigration-taboo/ when people told you about their shattered dreams.
You offered some encouraging words (didn’t really seem all that encouraging as fake) but what was more important for you is to CATEGORIZE all those people whose dreams didn’t work out based on their country. You are literally obsessed with this. You even categorize and pre-judge people based on their location/region in FRANCE and SOUTH AMERICA, like who made you an anthropologist?
Racism in 21st century isn’t about so much about Ku-Klax and mob-lynching is it is about about prejudices and covert hostility and putting people in boxes based on their country of origin — that is something you do a lot, whether you admit it or not.
I also see some victim blaming on your blog how some people didn’t do enough research and thus don’t deserve to be helped. Really? How much research did you do exactly? Nada. You just landed there and you became preggo and a blogger, and to be frank, both don’t require hard work at all, and both could be done literally anywhere in the world.
In this post you skiddadle conveniently how France is a country of despair, of hopelessness, of broken dreams, how people born in the right family can do ANYTHING they want while regular people spend most of their lives MISERABLE and STUCK.
You really needn’t be alive if your life is spent in despair and misery, but you conveniently leave that part out.
You are given this opportunity and a voice to DO something for your community yet you whine and nitpick how helping is too much and how you can’t do people’s research for them while you literally admit you didn’t do any research yourself.
Instead, you pretend to be helpful while you assume this role of a Gatekeeper where you help your “friends” but really demoralize other people cos hey, you’re human, too, and you don’t want anyone else taking something you never truly worked for.
Why make the world a better place while you can pretend to be “neutral” because, despite what’s written here, you’re really here to discourage people you pre-judge as less-worthy.
What kind of research did you do, anyway? What kind of job do you have? Is freelancer a thing?
You say to people “Dude, Google!” but when I google your blog I see NOTHING helpful, just some 3/10 middle-aged woman posing in Brazil, London, Boston, New York, Sao Paolo, Chile while….freelancing… but at the same time you’re worried about your future financially?
Well Juliette, as you put it yourself, no one can do the work for you. You’re not exactly kind and helpful to people who come asking you for help (more like demoralising).
I don’t think you should worry about people helping you when they see that all you do is travel to South America while freelancing, pre-judge and discourage others.
You are the pot calling the kettle black. You get benefits of the Canadian goverment to travel around the world while not doing much but frown when people mention “hard work”.
I genuinely don’t know what’s your blog’s purpose because a) you are not there to help people but at the same time b) you look nothing like an Instagram model.
You DO know that even if you relocated to Brazil you’d need to find a JOB and a fair government to sponsor your travels? But somehow you are gravely offended when people ask you for encouragement. They should do their RESEARCH and Google even though you did neither, eh?
What an arrogant braggart, take your head out your own arse, it should help.
Oh for fuck’s sake… not even worth arguing.
Good luck with life.