Am I over-judging Canada?
 

I was in my second year of university the first time I visited Canada in the summer. I remember going back home to Manchester and telling my parents how much I love the country. This feeling stayed with me - everytime I took the opportunity to visit Canada. I was determined to live the dream of living in Canada and experiencing it fully...until I did.

I am from Manchester, I'm a pharmacist and I completed a PhD in pharmacy from the University of Manchester. I was offered to work as a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Toronto, and despite the salary being less than what I earned in Manchester, I still accepted it.

I arrived on the 26th December 2017 to one of the coldest winters in Canada since 1997. First shock - but expected.

Then I went on to look for apartments in Toronto - if you want an apartment on your own, you're looking to pay $1400 minimum, excluding utilities and monthly subway charges. I was almost scammed the first time, until I found a Facebook group that opened my eyes to these issues in Canada - from scamming to bed bugs and cockroach issues. Viewing apartments was a horrifying experience. If you want a decent apartment in an okay area, expect to have a minimum of half of your pay go towards a roof over your head that is barely big enough to even accommodate you and your bags.

I wanted to open a bank account and found that I will get charged for every debit transaction made - or will have a limit on the number of free transactions. Overdraft? I was given $100 in comparison to £1250 in England and no fees for using your debit/using another banks ATM machine.

Then I got on the GOTrain - I'm currently commuting from Burlington until I find a place in Toronto because I'm staying with a friend - $465 a month is the cost of commuting from Burlington to the university. Wifi on the train? Nope. Any kind of services on the train? No.

I went to get a SIM card and the best offer I could get was $60 a month from freedom mobile for 10GB of internet. For £10 I can get a sim only plan with unlimited internet.

The research is also very much lacking - I feel Canada is 20 years behind in pharmacy research in comparison to England.

It's been a month since I have arrived and I am trying to be as objective as possible in my opinions. I am really struggling to settle with this mind frame, where I am constantly comparing the expenses and services provided in England and specifically Manchester, with Toronto.

I guess the reason I am writing this is I am hoping someone will tell me that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I'm very homesick and need a silver lining to hold onto.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

You probably know better than anyone if there is light at the end of the tunnel.

When I first graduated I took a job in London that paid barely enough to keep my head above water. All I could afford was a room in a shared house, but I knew my pay would increase fairly rapidly, almost trebling in three years, and up six-fold in eleven years.

I stayed sharing a house to save a deposit to buy my own place. It took seven years from graduation to get a stable job and enough cash for the department on a home, but things improved year-on-year, enough to keep me optimistic about the future.

If you don't have a path to significantly higher pay then things are going to remain financially tough, and in your current situation I would strongly recommend that you swallow your pride and find a shared house rather than paying for your own gaff.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

Can't comment at all on the stage of pharmaceutical research, but for cost of living - you shouldn't be mentally comparing Toronto with Manchester. Compare it with London (where, getting a one bed by yourself in a decent area would run you well above £800). If you were moving to a much more expensive city, then taking a pay cut to do it was.... unfortunate.

A SIM with unlimited data for £10? Really? I used to have an unlimited plan from 3, but they discontinued them to new customers years back, got to keep it through grandfathering in - another may have started, but I hadn't heard of it before I left. Regardless, phone plans in Canada tend to be more yes, especially data (the cost of administering a network across the area of Europe with a population the size of Poland to pay for it).

Other than phone & banking (you can get free accounts from Simplii, Tangerine), your problems seem mainly Toronto-specific... which are similar to the reasons why I left London as soon as I could after moving there. Expensive cities aren't really good places to be middle income :/

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

Yep I think that is pretty normal in England from what I can tell. Its a tiny country with a massive population of cell users so I guess its no surprise really, still annoying...
Agreed - Toronto is seriously expensive. Can the OP move anywhere else or stop comparing apples to oranges.


I wish the OP all the best in getting out of this mindframe as I dont think it will help you achieve your dream at all

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

I don't know where you can get unlimited data for £10. I'm with GiffGaff which are one of the best deals, if not the best. I pay £12 for 4gig.
The cheapest unlimited data I could find was with 3 for £34/month.
You can get 12 gig for £14 from 3. But I personally wouldn't use 3 again after multiple tries with them and every time I've had signal issues.


I do take the point that Canada has much more expensive mobile phones though.


On a side, the name Freedom mobile makes me laugh, because their plans are based on coverage zones which to me seems more restrictive than freedom.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

I honestly think you are in the stage where you cant help comparing everything in Canada to the UK (we all did it and it is part of the culture shock). Eventually you will stop doing it as much and then stop altogether and just accept that things are different (with the exception of crown corporations, god I hate crown corporations :)).

Someone on the forums once said that the culture shock is bigger when coming to another a English speaking commonwealth country as you don't anticipate such a large shock but in reality things can be very different and it creeps up on you.

As others have said you need to thing of the GTO more akin to London than Northern England.

On banking you can pay a monthly fee and get unlimited transactions. I pay around $15 a month for unlimited banking with RBC. With over drafts and credit cards don't forgot that you have next to no credit history in Canada yet and that this will need some time to establish.

Best of luck and hope it works out.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

TD gives me unlimited Banking with no fees when you maintain a certain Balance.

If you think Toronto is a shock, I moved to Stockholm in the middle of winter back in 1989. To drown my sorrows over the extreme cold and long dark nights I went into the closest thing to an English pub and was shocked to pay over £5 a pint, nearly 3 times the price back in the UK. After 3 months, I stopped comparing prices and just accepted it

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

+1!

We came over for good in early November 2017. We have now stopped the 'comparison thing' and are settling in. I can assure you the weather in Ottawa is waaaayyy tougher than Toronto (but we knew that before we came)!

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

Oh yes....tough breed the Ottawans!! Toronto will never live it down for calling in the army to remove snow! :rofl::lol:

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

It has always confused me why someone would want to leave one perfectly good fantastic city for another fantastic city and gain nothing in return.

Personally I think us Brits are spoilt, most of us emigrated from fairly decent areas in the UK and are upset that Canada is 15 years behind the times when compared to the UK. We either need to stop comparing, get used to it, or move back.

Most new immigrants to Canada are not as fortunate as us yet they are thankful they have moved to a country with decent infrastructure, health care and the ability to work.

Every time I meet up with my Wife's side of the family it really grounds me. Hardworking Filipino's that were dentists, engineers, teachers etc back in the Philippines now working in fast food restaurants.

Do they complain about? absolutely they do, but not about the price of a PAYG sim card or travel pass. They are so much happier with their new life they overlook the small things and concentrate their efforts on getting their skills converted to Canadian standards so they can get better jobs.

Can you imagine a UK family emigrating to Vancouver and working in Dairy Queen while they go to school at night? It just wouldn't happen.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

That wasn't Toronto, it was Mel Lastman.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

Out of curiosity, how much are U of T paying you as a postdoc?

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

But wait until Spring, Summer and Fall. You’ll quickly forget about the overly tough winter and you’ll know what to expect next November.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

Sounds like someone just stole your rose coloured spectacles. It's very different living in a place compared to visiting and it's tough when you realize that. Try and stop comparing, it's a different country, they do things differently here and change is hard to deal with. Winter is a bad time to arrive, hang on in there until the summer comes, you may feel much more positive about your move. In the meantime, just deal with the crap and try to focus only on the positives - think hard you will find some.

Re: Am I over-judging Canada?
 

I believe Presto cards users now benefit from a lower TTC rate when transferring to/from GO services. Also, if you're heading in to Toronto at weekends (assuming you go in Mon-Fri for work) on your work route, it'll be free (tops out at 40 trips/month, incremental fare charge drops after 35/month)

As for wi-fi on trains... GO transit is basically suburban services, I don't recall the equivalent in the UK having a free service (and the trains on the Stockport to Buxton line still don't have toilets on board, at least the one I took in the summer didn't...)

However, it seems that Metrolinx are exploring wi-fi provision for both GO buses and trains. EoI deadline was about six months ago, so watch this space... interesting.

FWIW, VIA is the national train company, and *does* have wi-fi on board. Again, quite a different experience from Virgin Trains, say - but you can score some pretty damn cheap advance tickets to Montreal, for example (which might be something to think about once the weather warms up - it's a great city, and well worth visiting while you're in Canada).

I don't know how much data you want/need, but I have a data-only SIM from Fido that's $15/month for 3Gb. I've got VOIP calls/SMS through voip.ms (which costs next to nothing) but to be brutally honest $60/10Gb seems to be the floor price for more data these days. As others have said, it's a totally different market here.

Can't speak to pharmacy research, but there's most definitely leading research going on in Canadian universities across several disciplines. Could it just be your supervisor, and/or the funded project you're working on? Maybe this is a good time to get networking once you have your feet under the table, and see what is going on at other unis.

As others have said, compare prices to London and you're probably closer to the mark. I know and love both Manchester and London, and to be frank you can't compare either of them to Toronto - it's a nice enough place, but very different.

Moving in winter's pretty hardcore. That said, maybe try and make the most of the season - maybe do a trip to Glen Eden with some other postdocs and try out skiiing? (Chicopee is another, but I suspect GE would be easier for you to meet up with colleagues). If you like beer, there's some amazing breweries to check out. On a budget? Embrace the joys of pho and other Vietnamese food (loads of places around, never really saw much in Mcr although it's been a while, but IIRC in London it's still pretty niche).

I believe there's plenty of free stuff to be had at the Harbourfront Centre, and easy enough to get on the GO back to Burlington. This will be more attractive as the seasons improve ;)

Hang in there. You've not been here long. And you came during a *bloody* cold month (even by local standards!). Good luck!