They say time reduces the memory of the pain of a traumatic event. So, in a sadomasochistic way (and maybe so I can help others of you), I’m going to write some blog posts on immigrating to Canada and what we’ve learned along the way as new immigrants. Some of them will be about the mechanics of emigrating, some of them will be about the emotions, and some of them will be about the differences (funny and otherwise) between South Africa and Canada. I’ll probably revisit the posts every now and again to remind myself how insane it all was.
Now to start at the start, and set the scene for the whole adventure. Who Canada? What Canada? Where Canada? When Canada? How Canada? Okay maybe some of these questions don’t make sense to set the scene – or, you know, even make sense as questions. So let’s start with ‘why Canada’, since most South Africans looked at us in horror when we started talking about moving to a country where we have to clean our own house and the weather is routinely -20c.
CF and I knew we were meant for each other when we realised we independently come to the conclusion that we wanted to move overseas, and more specifically to immigrate to Canada. We came to this realisation three months into dating each other, pretty much right after CF had returned from a Contiki in Canada. She brought with her some amazing photographs and stories of her trip. I’d been thinking about, and was actively in the process of, applying for permanent residency in Canada for nearly a year, so I was maybe a bit further down the path than CF.
After realising this, we obviously talked a lot about moving, and why we wanted to move, and what our criteria were for considering where we wanted to move, and what the alternatives to moving overseas were. We have South African passports, wanted to move to an English-speaking country, and in CF’s case had a very specific job which slimmed the options down significantly and made our decision much easier. Knowing that we wanted to move (and having the support of our families) also helped immensely.
Probably the most critical part of immigrating is going somewhere where you can earn a living. Apparently that’s a requirement for housing, food and water. Huh, how bizarre. Anyway, South African general practitioners only really have a straightforward, and (relatively) fast path to practicing as fully licensed physicians in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
Whilst GPs and specialists can obviously move to other countries, these countries typically require doctors to complete a (three-year plus) residency program to become licensed, and understandably most South African doctors aren’t prepared to do that. My cybersecurity experience and certifications are, by contrast, significantly more portable (in theory), so this didn’t really factor into the decision-making behind immigrating to Canada specifically.
With the logical part of our decision partly made for us, let me expand a bit more on the emotional side of the decision. The UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand were not particularly attractive to us, for various reasons, which largely left Canada as our clear option. Canada drew me in with its size and beauty, the proximity to the US (for better or worse), the stories my friends and family in Canada told of the country, the (perceived) politics, and the career possibilities. It attracted CF with its the beauty, the people, the (relative) ease of converting her South African medical license, the fact that she already had a good friend practising here, and the better career opportunities. We were pretty much on the same page most of the way for the things drawing us to Canada.
I’m not really going to talk about the push factors for emigrating from South Africa, but they were obviously there and they’re part of any decision anyone ever makes to emigrate. All I’ll say on that matter, for now, is that if your sole decision to emigrate is based on things pushing you away from the country where you’re living, you should probably have a stop and think about it some more. You’re going to need that combination of things pushing you away from one country and also pulling you toward a new country to make the emigration easier on yourself and your family. It’s an incredibly tough thing to do, both during the process and when you’re in your new country, and you’ll really need that concrete sense of why you’re there to help get you through the tough times.
The ‘why’ and ‘where’ of emigrating will be different for everyone, and that’s okay. We all want different things. I think this post pretty much summarizes our ‘why’ and ‘where’ of immigrating to Canada. How we ended up in Alberta, four and a half hours north of Edmonton in a small community near the Rockies is a story for another post. Until next week!
PS.
Here are some of the pics CF took on that Contiki in 2019. She’s pretty good with a camera.
2 responses to “Oh, Canada! On the why behind immigrating to Canada”
My sister struck it lucky with godparents. I have no clue what my godparents on my dad’s side of the family did or do for a living. My godparents on my mom’s side of the family is a farmer and his late wife was a primary school teacher. My sister’s godparents are a retired metallurgical engineer and a retired Afrikaans teacher who live in a retirement community in Rustenburg now but they also own farms with Simmental and other cattle between Rustenburg and Swartruggnes where their children, who are in their 30s and 40s, now live. When these godparents lived on a smallholding near Eikenhof their next door neighbours, a doctor/GP and his wife and kids, emigrated to Saskatchewan in Canada. This was in the early 1990s or late 1980s already, though. I tried googling to find his name for your CF but my search was in vain.
In the paragraph that starts “With the logical part” you used “it’s” when you should have used “its” twice.
South African doctors make up the large majority of doctors in rural areas in Alberta, so I also wouldn’t be surprised to find SA-born doctors in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, BC and so on. Alberta is the most direct path for a South African doctor to get licensed in Canada, which is the topic of another post 🙂
And you are absolutely correct! This is what I get for editing the post outside of Scrivener and not doing a proper spelling or grammar check.