Irishcpl

Hi Guys,

I believe this to be my first post on here, my wife and I applied for our Permanent resident satus in Canada in the year 2000 same year as we married.
Approx 6 mths later we were granted our PR Visas after a gruelling process. I myself worked for Bombardier Aerospace as a CNC Programmer/Machinist here making Aircraft parts until redundancies.My wife was a secretary.

We thought we were on the pigs back. We emigrated to Ontario in sept 2000, we were both 26 yrs old. Sold our house furniture and gave lots of stuff to friends and neighbours. I left my much loved rottweiler dog (now passed at 14yrs old) with my Mum who lived at the bottom of my street. Was the sadest thing I ever seen was my Mum standing at the window as my taxi drove by her house..The reality was setting in. But we got on with it. Needless to say we arrived at the airport like two mooncats. But we followed it through.

We arrived in Toronto and rented an empty apartment in Mississauga for $1200 cad mth. We entered the apartment without a stick of furniture. We slept on an inflatable airmatress in the lounge for a week. We felt we had made a massive mistake and we cried for two days.

We quickly received the money from our house sale and started to purchase all new stuff for the apartment and a car,but somewhere in the back of our minds we were telling ourselves this may not be forever. We joined the local gym and started to socialise. I started applying for jobs but almost 6 weeks later not a single reply. The money was running out fast!
We were enjoying the new adventure but knew it would not last long if we did not get jobs very soon.

Family phones calls from inlaws became a problem and it was evident that my wife's Mum was trying to get her to come home. Shortly after this we both crumbled in a panicked state and decided to return home. Sold everything up at a massive loss, left the car back to the dealer to sell. Within days we were back in N.Ireland. What a mistake.. it was only days before we wanted to go again. We stayed with my mother for a number of weeks before going back to the same apartment, which we kept renting just incase :S Low and behold we were back on the plane on the dead of winter mid january 2001. With the ever decreasing funds dwindling once more.

With nothing more in the apartment once more except except an inflatable airbed. We picked up the mail from the office on the block and not a single reply to the countless jobs my wife and I had applied for, this got us extremely worried. We bottled it went to a hotel and after 5 days we flew back to N.Ireland. Back to my mums house and spare room as we had no where else to go. My wife and I quickly gave up the will to live..both becoming very depressed and drinking every night in the room, we didnt apply for any jobs in N.Ireland as I am telling you there were none, this was our biggest motivation to move, that and the violence and the weather.

After a further 4mths of this we decided to go back to Canada , but this time we went to an expat a childhood friend of mine , that my pride didn't want to contact until I had made it in Canada.. More fool me... take it from me unless you are going to a friend or family.. DONT GO!

John let us live with him and his wife in Waterloo for approx 5mths. When I arrived he had my canadian car in his garage this made me feel better and for the first time we felt supported and knew we could make it. How wrong was I!!! We spent the next 4mths job hunting on a daily basis for approx 6-8hrs a day.. resume dropping and cold calling.. No Dice! Until one day I called a small machine shop and got speaking with a scotchman who offered me ajob. I was thrilled!!! As was my wife and friends!! We thought, finally payoff! I am telling you I have never been happier, getting up for work at 6.30 and it was 25C , driving to work listening to Dire Straits I was in heaven..I wasn't earning as much money as I did in N.Ireland..but it was a start. It lasted all of 3 weeks before the work dried up and rumours of recession surfaced. My wife got a secretarial job the day after I got laid off!! The Irony was too much to bear! Needless to say I was getting seriously depressed. I applied for every job going.....over qualified under qualified, wombling free!! Blah Blah!! I went for one apptitude test where I was told I got 100%, but there was no way they could offer me the job! Coz I would never stay.The canadian's laidback attitude was starting to drive me nuts...My wife lifted her first cheque of $380, I burst into tears as this was never going to be enough for us to live. Shortly after this my wife's company where she worked went bust and we were jobless again. Extremely lonely and depressed. I was now Sept I got a call from Bombardier Canada who were going to offer me a job, I was elated and once more we thought things were looking up! WRONG!!!! Sept 11th finished the aerospace market and I was jobless once more!! Recession ensued and we ended up back in my mum's spare room!! More Drink!!

I managed to get a job working with my Dad in a machine shop in My home town of Derry. The money was quite good so I was reasonably happy for a few months, but then the comparison game started...I think i nearly drove my family and friends mental with "In Canada" statements...how everything is better over there. I dabbled in a business idea with little or no money before it failed. For a futher two years we lived in my Mum's spare room, eating dinners off a bed! I was offered a good job with a company in Belfast , but it meant a 3 1/2 hr round trip on the craziest roads you have ever seen...with very little motorway. I took it, this gave us the opportunity to rent a house of our own and did this commute and job for a further 18mths..My wife got a job for a local education group and we had money again for the first time in years!

With no jobs for me in Derry and with commute seeming to get longer each and everytime I was trapped and exhausted! Canada was rearing its head again!We went back and I went back to the small machine shop I had worked for the last time a few years ago. We moved into the worst motel I have ever stayed in and needless to say we were heartbroken with that sinking feeling setting in.. I needed to stay here for a few weeks to get the money for a down payment on an apartment. My old job in N.Ireland looked appealing and the drive didn't seem that bad anymore. Its funny how your mind likes to trick you. So back we went and I was back in my last job as quick as a flash, quicly returning to "In Canada Statements" again.

I left that job in Belfast to work for another company and continued the commute for another 2 years but the Canada feeling has never gone away.
We took a holiday back to Canada and I was offered a job as an Engineering Manager for a large aerospace company while we were there, we were both very apprehensive but we decided to give it one more shot, so off we went again staying with another friend this time. This company promised me the world so we once again gullably agreed. It took them a month to start me and when they did I was not doing the job I was supposed to. They hadn't one brick laid in the new extension I was supposed to managed. I was stuck on the dirtiest oldest machine in the place for approx 2mths,carrot in front of the donkey style. I felt I had stepped back 20 yrs..
After a month and with a row with another operator I snapped a 22m/m spanner in two and left promptly..within a week I was back in N.Ireland!! Metal Right!

I then had two choices go back to the job in belfast and do the drive again.
Or go back to the business idea I had...we took a chance and started the business. got 12k of debt for stock and started selling it.. quickly I was making more money a day than I had a week engineering..I was so happy!!
My wife got a good job as a PA in the local UNI. Things were looking up and we bought our first house since 2000, that was 3 years ago... We were extremely happy with this , but still have always felt we don't belong in N.Ireland.... Canada has never went away for us.

My business is quite sucessful now and is turning 500k this year..but guess what we have been back to Canada twice on holidays and felt we could expand the business there. We were due to go TODAY Friday 24th of July after months of planning, due family issues for the last month we lost the plot today hrs before we were supposed to go and decided against it.. My head is so screwed with this and I felt I could loose everything including the UK Business, this maybe irrational fears and the memories of the past experiences..but we are that scrambled we don't know anymore.We do know that we can never be in Canada again feeling as we have done before.. We hate living in N.Ireland but feel that Canada may not be the anwser...

I welcome your thoughts, I know this reads crazy but we just wanted a better life that didn't want us!

Mummy in the foothills

OMG I'm exhausted just reading that!
I think you are seeing Canada through rosy glasses and a few holidays. It's done nothing for you but make you miserable and run home to your moms spare room.
Maybe you could expand the business elsewhere in Europe, save upping sticks and loosing all you've built all over again.
If it didn't work so many times before what is so different now? it's in recession like everywhere else.

quoll

Blimey, I think you get the pingponger of the year award!

I guess I am surprised that you still want to give it a go even though it has failed you so many times. Just what will your "better life" look like? Perhaps once you have sorted that, then you can look at ways of bettering it with perhaps less risk and less pain. After all that you have been through, do you really want to chuck away what is working and risk it all?

Good luck - I dont envy you your decision making!

Irishcpl

Unfortunately for us some of our best times and worst times have been in Canada. I think the underlying issue this time was family problems on my wifes side, namely my wifes parents breaking up and reuniting 2 times in the last 4 weeks. Then on the eve of our travel her father absconds again, without so much as a goodbye. This was playing heavily on my wifes mind and she was emationally drained and panicky which inturn set me off.

Thanks for listening

Londonuck

Blimey that was some read.

Totally agree with first sentence.

Bevm

I'm in Canada and appreciate it's charms. Heading back to England soon and reckon there's just as many charms in the UK.

Why is it your home town or Canada. Try living somewhere else in the UK. Can your business be operated anywhere? Sounds like it. So, go hunting for your perfect place.

I may be completely wrong on this, but I suspect part of the appeal of Canada is that it's a long way from all those relatives! Cornwall would probably do just as well. Or London. Or York. Or a village in the Cotswolds....

Bev

Irishcpl

Hi Bev, I think you hit the nail on the head for me its a double edged sword.
My wifes family is a nightmare & mine are so quiet and give us no trouble!So it was hard for me to leave them and I felt resentment because I had too!
I can't remember a single week that has gone by that someone in my wifes family (usually her mother) phoning our house or my mums house to report the latest catastrophe. I had considered leaving my wife on a few occassions just so the noise would stop. I myself am a very peaceful person and she is too! It definetly was a huge motivation to emigrate. I just wished it had of worked out better the first few times (sounds strange saying few times ) Think I would have learned after the first time right!!

N.Ireland can be a very unfriendly judgemental place, this left us when we moved to Canada and we felt free, no one looking at you as if to say "What the f**k are you looking at " no more watching your back in the local pub... N Ireland has some beautiful scenery which I always learn to appreciate just before I go. But can be quickly sullied by the narrow minded people living in its valleys! Misery loves company, couldnt be more true for this place and it even seems that the ones closest to you become envious of your success and free thinking that they sabotage it conciously or subconciously I am not sure.

Mummy in the foothills

Trouble is your Mother in law will still have phone access even if you are in Canada and thus your wife will be frantic from a long distance.
Will you send her back to visit frequently during the troubles between her parents?
I think putting distance between you both and the in laws is a brilliant idea, for me I'd put a smaller body of water and try mainland UK. Make a list of what you need and want in a area you want to settle in, then travel the UK/Europe and find it closer so you can stop ping ponging. UK is very diverse there's bound to be a place that's just right.

MartianTom

Hats off to you. I don't think I could cope with that much emotional turmoil. I'd been having serious second thoughts about the whole thing - and now, today, I've received the request for the medical report and the RPR fee. I've a history of depression and have recently gone back onto anti-depressants following a really bad spell. I've been reading some posts about people with depression having problems with the medicals - further requests for psychiatrist's reports, etc - and I just don't think, on balance, that I want to have to deal with all that. So... I'm staying put. Things aren't brilliant here - but the prospect of them all possibly becoming so much worse if resettlement doesn't work out for me is more than I'm prepared to risk. If I went through what you've been through - and I know that the prospect of that is quite high, given the way I am - well.... I don't even want to think about it. I've a nest egg that it's taken me a lot of years and a lot of grief to put together. Time I started enjoying it, I think, rather than risking it all on the unknown.

Good luck to you both in whatever you decide to do.

JAJ

Do you still have valid permanent resident status in Canada?

Irishcpl

Yes everything is still valid, or we would not go.

JAJ

Unclear how your resident status can still be valid ... you only seem to have spent a few weeks in Canada at a time.

Have you spent at least 2 years in Canada as a permanent resident in the last 5 years?

Irishcpl

Are you serious??
My status is my business and if I have made special arrangements with the canadian high comission my business also....lets not get tied up with the details here. I am just on here to tell my story...so hopefully I can enlighten someone else.

JAJ

Unclear what these special arrangements could be ... the law is very clear.

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/informa...des/5445EA.asp

bloomfieldtj

OMG! How utterly stressful! It must be stressful for your whole family, problematic or not. I think you need to make a decision about where to be and stick to it, be it in NI, Canada or the UK perhaps. You need to put down some roots and make a place "home".

Good luck.

JB.