The past few days I've been mostly feeling glum and panicked about the election of the previously unelected oil spiv. Aside from that, I've been fielding questions about how I immigrated to Canada, where I am a landed immigrant -- holding the equivalent of a green card here. The way I did it was by marrying a Canadian, and the way my particular Canadian ended up being Canadian at all was by having an American father who married a Canadian. So my advice is:

• Start flirting with Vancouverites and Torontonians (or White Horsians!) on Nerve.
• Take the skilled worker test to see if you qualify (with a score above 67).
• Apply now. It will take a long time -- my application took about a year, but I've heard it takes more than two years these days. You will have to get fingerprinted, reviewed by the local police and cleared by the FBI. You will also have to have a medical exam -- with the universal health care system, they want to make sure they don't have an influx of people coming just to get medical services.
• Start saving money. The government wants to know that you can support yourself, so if you are able to show them that you have a schwack of cash -- I'm thinking $50,000 or so -- it will demonstrate you have enough to live on for a year while you get settled and find work. This is an important and overlooked requirement.
• Another avenue is to get a job first, and have the company sponsor you. This is either easier or harder than going about it the other way. Easier because it can be quicker, but harder because you have to have a specific set of job skills that are needed in Canada, because you are dependent on your employer to stay in the country, and the visa is only for a year (though they are renewable).

It helps, of course, if you have family that is already living here that can sponsor you.

LINK | 12:41 PM | TB

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