Re:Canada- What's the deal up there?

LOL!!! we are a cute people!! to extoll the virtues of canadians would take some time, please feel free to email me and i can fill you in over the course of the next few weeks, lol!! but heather, we also claim people like nellie furtado, from my island, victoria in particular, and not sure whether i want to claim her or not, but pamela lee anderson is from the comox valley on vancouver island which is also where i hail from. michael j fox is a canadian, vancouver boy and another who i would just as soon not claim any ties would be captain kirk from star trek, lord forgive me but i have forgotten the guys name,(go figure) and i was so sure he was memorable!!! please, we will lend you alannis morrisette, keep her as long as you like and with any luck we will forget to ask for her back. but aside from all of that, vancouver city on the mainland is a thriving metropolis, and can easily compete with any large american city as far as entertainment and things to do, but with an  added bonus of extreme and breathtaking beauty. (sheesh, do i sound a wee bit proud?) (and did i just hear that sneaky canadian accent creeping in again, damn and i work so hard!!!) however, i am a huge LA fan, am writing this blurb whilst sitting in redondo beach having just returned from a great dinner at a greek restaraunt in malibu! and what a beautiful day!!! take a trip to canada, not only is your dollar worth more, but you will find it well worth it in many other ways, hugs, dana

1) Hockey

2) Beer

"Can Americans work and live in Canada if they are not Canadian residents?"

On the assumption you didn't really mean "live in Canada" AND "Canadian residents" (because if you lived there that would make you a Canadian resident) but instead meant "permanent resident" or "immigrant" or "alien", the answer is, it depends...lol.

Depending on your education, and your field of expertise, you can qualify for a work visa in Canada with no problem. But, the range of people who qualify is pretty narrow...think highly educated technical types. The idea is that your presence will HELP the Canadian economy because you have skills that are difficult for Canadian companies to find locally.

Otherwise, the converse is true...the Canadian government would want to know why your employer hired YOU versus a Canadian in need of a job. Thus, your work visa would require sponsorship. That actually isn’t terribly difficult either, but there is a process, and it does take time, and many companies aren't willing to do it unless they really need your skills badly (and chances are you would have then qualified under NAFTA as described in the paragraph above anyway)

So, if you are wondering if you could go live in Canada and work the same as you could go live in Nevada and work, the answer is no.  But the process isn't terribly, terribly difficult, again assuming you have some real skills that would be of value to the Canadian economy.

The other alternative, which I mention since you said "live in Canada" would be to become a permanent resident. This isn't difficult either, thanks to the close relationship of the United States and Canada. It also helps that Canada has relatively lax immigration laws, driven by A) the fact that Canadians like to think of themselves as really nice people, sort of the "good guys" of the world community, and B) immigration is encouraged to assist the Canadian economy, which does lack certain skill sets in certain industry sectors.

To become a permanent resident you would either need sponsorship by a immediate family member who is a Canadian citizen, and who could demonstrate the ability to provide for you while you waited out to process for work eligibility (no, the two don't go hand in hand), or you could marry a Canadian citizen (and again, wait for your work eligibility to come thru, though interestingly enough, a spouse doesn't have to prove that they can support you), or lastly, you can apply on your own merits.

To qualify for Canadian residency on your own merits, you pass thru a screening process that is designed to determine if you will be able to "integrate" into Canadian society. Really, the purpose is, again, to make sure you are going to be an ASSEST to the Canadian economy rather than a liability. So, much like the work visa qualification, it helps to have an advanced degree, and have technical work experience. Insofar as the integration part, it help to be of a certain age (too young, you can't really get a "good" job...too old, you are going to retire soon and be "a burden"), to be able to demonstrate strong ties to a Canadian citizen (who will help you "integrate"), and to be bi lingual (Canada has two official languages...French and English. You get brownie points if you speak both).

Depending on your answers to these questions, you get a score. Get enough points, you're in, don’t get enough points, you're out and left to use the other means described above.

Bottom line...it isn't as easy to just "up and move" to Canada, as it would be in the Untied States to simply pull up roots and go to another state. It *IS* a different country, something Canadians take joy in reminding Americans. Essentially, you have to prove that you either A) already know someone in Canada who is willing to take care of and be responsible for you, or B) You have skills of a nature that unemployment is not at all a concern, and that you won't be taking a job away from a Canadian citizen.

Insofar as your other questions...yes, I go up for fun all the time (Canadians, like Europeans, are a lot less uptight about sex), you need to be able to prove your citizenship when you cross the border, so ideally you need a passport, though a birth certificate will do, when you return the qualifications are the same...you need to prove you are a US citizen, so you can use the same documents, and as a rule, Canadians are fun loving people, but less prone to sheer stupidity than Americans (its that whole "proper British behavior" sort of thing). But again, when it comes to sex, they are less puritan (For example, as been posted here before, prostitution technically is NOT illegal in Canada, though they have all sorts of rules which functionally make it so...and many of the major newspapers run pictures of nearly nude girls every day on the back page or inside cover).

Hope this helps!!

BTW...I know Canadians who would tell you that Americans talk funny, as in don't speak English, but instead speak "American"


-- Modified on 10/7/2002 5:14:16 AM

The others have answered your questions pretty well.  I will add that having spent several summers in Vancouver I love that it stays light until about 10pm (however, conversely it gets dark very early in the winter).  Vancouver in the summer is a great place to visit--a beautiful city with so much to do and see.

And BTW, while it does fluctuate some an American dollar is worth about $1.50 Canadian.

They dont really talk so funny Heather.  Its the SPELLING they have the problem with.

And I will probably hear from some Canadian on that one.

Re:Canada- What's the deal up there?

Upscale New York and Russia????? Hold on a sec..I gotta go check if my dog sled is double parked and turn up the heat in my igloo sorry couldn't resist that. Hey we even have indoor plumbing, just got that last year though.lol.. Oh no Im on a roll.lol... Hey we have Dana up here , for now anyway..we have to be civilized..

from a friendly but sarcastic Canuck

Chuck

Canada is fantastic! The people are very warm and kind. If you loose your wallet. You can expect to get a phone call telling you that your wallet has been found and all the money is still in it.

It's very cold sometimes and we have tunnels,(like gerbils) when it hits -30 to -40. Otherwise it's beautiful and sometimes warm.

Also your money is amazing compared to ours! Shop till you drop
One last thing, Escorting/Companions are legal for dinner, dancing etc.. but anything else is not. You don't want to be thrown into one of Canada's harsh Prisons. Ask Charels Eng.

T

Canada Is Beautiful

I have been to Canada many times, both winter and summer. Yes, it can be cold-very cold. But not any colder than Buffalo or Chicago, unless you go really far north. Ninety percent of the population, and nearly all the major cities, are within 100 miles of the U.S. border.

Canadian cities are absolutely immaculate. You'll be hard pressed to find so much as a piece of paper on the streets. I've seen city workers hosing down the sidewalks in Toronto. You will never see beer cans in the gutters. Crime is low in most places.

To put this back on topic, it's my understanding that outcall is completely legal up there. And it's a bargain too. The Canadian dollar is worth about 67 cents U.S.

Most Americans know absolutely nothing about Canada, its geography, its people, or its history. Well, that's their loss.

Friendly people, safe streets at night, no guns allowed, full ocntact nude laps, and legal escorts. I am currently working on a project that requires me to be in Detroit 7-10 days a month. My LA hobby money* is being spent in Toronto, 3.5 hours away. One superstar goes for $130 US an hour. Enough said?









* a long and boring post on the MA/Ali tiff is forthcoming. Stay tuned.

Sorry to be a party pooper. What most people have said about VISITING Canada is quite accurate to my experience, as well. Immaculate streets, no hand-guns, cheap excellent hobbying, friendly people. The outback, especially the lower Canadian Shield between Toronto and Ottawa, provides some of the most beautiful scenery in the world, each and every season of the year. There is nothing better than camping in an Ontario Provincial Park. If I ever propose marriage, I plan on doing it at the Tommy Thompson cairn on Canoe Lake, Algonquin Park, north of Toronto. The landscape holds a special place in my memory, and provides a type of serene counterpoint to the rest of this post of mine. Visiting a Canadian campground or touristing in a Canadian city can be a safe, happy (and currently quite cheap!) experience.

But the story is UTTERLY different for MOVING there.

I found that Canadians in general harbor a deeply felt resentment about the United States, and generally defend quite bigoted decisions on the basis of such nebulous concepts as "national unity" or "protecting our culture" (as though Anglophone Canadian culture EXISTED independent of the United States' influence AT ALL). Being an American citizen in Canada and trying to get a fair shake in the beginning stages of a standard career, would be like being a black man in 1930s New York and trying to become a stock broker. They have laws that make it illegal.

This is a little-known truth about US-Canada relations, and doesn't come up much in discussions. I lived there for a decade, and found I had to leave because ... well ... the bigotry got to me. Every DAY there was overheard somewhere "those stupid Americans" or "let me tell you what this dumb-fuck Yank did yesterday." If you replace "Americans" and "Yank" with "Ethiopians" and "Nigger," you get the picture.

In fact, speaking specifically about law and immigrations regulations, there are three legal categories in Canada: Local, Immigrant, and Immigrant-American. This allows the authorities to deny jobs to needy young American students, American beginners, et cetera, as long as it's in the name of "protecting Canadian culture." So you get remarkably bland, but very "Canadian" (because it was made there) movies, for example about gansters in Chicago, filmed with quite lucrative Canadian government underwriting, and absolutely no right for an American to work on the set, even if he is of landed-immigrant or resident-labourer status. But an Ethiopian immigrant with an identical Visa, with restrictions identical to the ones on the American's Visa, has full right to work there.

My recommendation to any half-way intelligent American who thinks that living in a more liberal and slightly more socialist nation would be a tempting reason to move to Canada: DON'T DO IT. You'll be a second-class citizen. And worse, this bigotry is not only legally mandated and taught in the schools, you'll also find that most participants in that bigotry will deny that they act like that. Don't give them the benefit of your time. Imagine how awful it must have been for a sensible, sensitive, well-educated German to grow up in the 1930s. Surrounded by people pushing bizarre notions on you, knowing you couldn't REALLY stand up for "the right" without risk of serious reprisal, probably initially not particularly interested in politics as much as just getting on with a "normal" life. Well, that's about how bad most Canadians feel about their daily life, especially when the subject of Americans comes up. Don't be so miserable as to surround yourself with Canadians, if you're an American.

I've lived in both places. I've been an American in both. Canada is no place for Americans. They'll drum the life out of you, sniping back-stabbing bigoted negative moment by bitchy underhanded secretly immigrant-bashing moment. They'll also tell you why they're right, about Canada being "better" than everywhere else -- the UN says it has the best standard of living (this was repeated a gillion times; never mind that the UN study uses watchdog statistics for EVERY NATION EXCEPT CANADA, for which the UN was requested to use official government statistics!). You'll also get this bizarre thing: "Canadians are so much better than Americans because we don't hike around talking about how much better we are. I mean, right now, I'm not really loud and obnoxious about how much better I am than everyone else, like an American would be." !!??

A cute quote. The difference between Canada and America: in the United States, nobody does what he's told unless he fears reprisal, and then he resents having to do it. In Canada, everybody does what he's told. And exactly no more what so ever. At all. Ever. And resents having to do it.

That having been said, I like very much their social system, the fact that everyone gets free health care and other necessities. And the average man-on-the-street will be much more worldly aware, particularly of European politics, and well-read than an American. As individuals, I'd rather have a Canadian or two sitting next to me at a dinner party. They'd be more likely to have read the newspaper that day, to have passed a few college courses, to think that thinking mattered. The average American would be likely obese and reactionary, and politically utterly uninformed. I have several great friends I left behind in Canada, who sympathize with the fact that I had to get out in order to get a life, because being an American there is nigh-on impossible. I miss them, their witty repartee -- they can always be relied on for a sardonic aside, a good sense of irony. But ironic life is also negative life, and it gets ya down, especially if you're the brunt of the irony 9 times out of 10.

Further, I'm not a lone voice in the wilderness. Every American I met in Anglophone Canada reported similar experiences. They all would take me aside, at some point early in our contact, and say something with a conspiratorial hush ... "Say, I hate to be negative, me being a guest here and all, but did you notice how NEGATIVE they are about us?" It came up time and again. I can't believe I was "just a fluke," or that I brought this negativity on myself.

They are, after all, a nation of backpackers who jingoistically display their national flag on their packs all over Europe, just to prove they aren't the typically jingoistic Americans.

Oh, by the way, I wasn't there after September 11th, 2001. Maybe things have changed -- I'll bet a lot of the world feels awful guilty about bad-mouthing Americans after that. If I were to have a high-level job with an American company, and I were asked to move to Canada for a while, I'd agree to do it, but it would have to be a limited time-frame -- no more than five years. As it was, I was trying to START as an American in Canada, and I found it utterly impossible. The fact that upon return to the USA I instantly got decent employment, at a level I deserved, that was well above what Canadians were grudgingly offering, indicates not only that the economy south of the border was so much stronger; but also that there were some other clear factors impeding my progress in several larger Anglophone cities in Canada.

Oh, by the way. None of the above applies to Francophone Canada. They love Yanks. They think (for some bizarre reason) that it's "Québec et les EE.UU. contre Canada" (Quebec and the United States against [English-speaking] Canada).


-- Modified on 10/9/2002 6:44:43 PM

Toronto is New York run by the Swiss. --Peter Ustinov