tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-58872814943303477482024-03-13T21:31:38.660-04:00The Ungrateful ImmigrantRemind me again why we're doing thisCareygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.comBlogger111125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-33996872842422714332010-07-15T14:37:00.002-04:002010-07-15T14:47:37.618-04:00You can't go home againOh, my darling Toronto, I've been gone not six weeks and what has become of you? I returned last Thursday for a week to find my <a href="http://www.chbooks.com/news/support-aint-rosedale-library">favourite bookstore gone</a>, one of my most frequented <a href="http://www.blogto.com/city/2010/07/fire_destroys_musa_and_several_homes_at_dundas_and_euclid/">restaurants trashed and burned</a>, my <a href="http://www.mastheadonline.com/news/2010/20100520691.shtml">former employer 1.5 publications and 20 people thinner</a>, and my friends jumping at <a href="http://cryptome.org/info/g8-police/g8-police2.htm">any sight of an unmarked van</a>. Oh yeah, and then there was that <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/23/canada-earthquake-toronto_n_622783.html">earthquake</a>...<br />
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That some of this was no surprise made the other bad news harder to bear. I found myself a tourist in my old town, naked without the bill-paying and other demands on my time that stymied me while a resident (still easier than wandering rootless in New York, where I am just a tourist with a local phone number). I would have felt better if I could have dropped in on <a href="http://pivotreadings.wordpress.com/">Pivot</a> for (not that) old times' sake, but they're off for the month. At least the <a href="http://thescream.ca/">Scream Literary Festival</a> went off without a hitch, and that <a href="http://voxpopulism.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/jakes-provoquestion-restated/">people are still drinking and fighting</a> as ever. Next year I shall attend as a member of the paying public, and my liver will thank me. <br />
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The fundamental point here is that I loathe change, when I am not its agent. That cities are alive is what I love about them, and a bit of death and decay only makes room for new growth (if only the new wasn't so often in the form of branded collaborations and pre-fabricated real estate), and none of this would have been any easier to take had I been around to witness it firsthand. So maybe it's not the change, but the insult to my ego that my old room won't be preserved just as it was when I left it. Sniff. <br />
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Thanks to Jenny, Aaron, Elisabeth, Luke, Lindsay, Allison, Em et al for couches, hugs, frisbees, one-speeds, slow dances -- all salves to the scabby little wounds on my heart.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-44591955717458973092010-07-01T18:52:00.001-04:002010-07-15T14:48:56.405-04:00New Yorkers pay more tax than SwedesSo Mr. O got his very first paycheque today. Considering we've been here for a month now, we were pretty excited about it. Let's just say that Willy Wonka's Golden Ticket wasn't all we'd hoped it would be.<br />
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New Yorkers pay 45% of their income in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_income_tax">federal, state and municipal tax</a>. That'd be okay if, say, in return people here received universal health care, or day care, or subsidized post-secondary education. Okay, to be fair, a monthly pass on the MTA is only $85, compared to <a href="http://www3.ttc.ca/Fares_and_passes/Prices/index.jsp">$121 for a TTC metropass</a>. And sure, there's a lot of grass to be mowed in Central Park, and all those <a href="http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=27&id=25466">bike lanes to be installed and then sandblasted off again in Williamsburg</a>, and oh yeah, a few good wars to pay for. I am all for paying teachers and sanitation workers and judges and engineers, they do good and important things. But Iraq? Ugh, I feel so dirty.<br />
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But 45%?! Seriously? I thought this was the land of the cash grab, of <i>laissez-faire</i> and free markets? You know, pay less in tax and give that money right to the grubbing insurance companies -- I mean, private sector. Really, we made more on less in Canada. And the Medicare and Social Security contributions are money that, as non-resident aliens, I am quite certain we shall never see again, even if we require health care or social benefits. The next time somebody refers to Finland as a socialist state I'm going to shove a W-4 up his or her nose.<br />
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I feel a Michael Moore moment coming on, maybe I'll put on a fat-suit and go stand at the border with a bullhorn, shouting "It's all a marketing scam, you've been tricked!" But that's probably because I'm the immigrant who's been tricked; this is probably something all of you knew, saw it in a Michael Moore movie or something. <br />
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P.s. I am really not in a Canada Day mood this year, but I am making a maple syrup glaze for the fish tonight. That'll have to suffice.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-8703228117987986102010-06-28T17:19:00.001-04:002010-06-28T17:20:36.004-04:00Reading Brooklyn<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhID8vIc72HKmxyzOeV1lpbpY7jeYGRWJCEf2jli_0fbaEzaWw3zlhKK5rYDNSK_HWAmBbUqXv9zGyPkF1FcphRZqYSW9wbRM02rScuZDgvygl5iQ-sMG0QuK-Rwb1VD-evXUmN54OEzek/s1600/P1050049.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhID8vIc72HKmxyzOeV1lpbpY7jeYGRWJCEf2jli_0fbaEzaWw3zlhKK5rYDNSK_HWAmBbUqXv9zGyPkF1FcphRZqYSW9wbRM02rScuZDgvygl5iQ-sMG0QuK-Rwb1VD-evXUmN54OEzek/s400/P1050049.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>Brooklyn is famous for its writers, and my 'hood is no exception. Marianne Moore lived around the corner from me on Cumberland, and Richard Wright lived on Carlton (echoes of Toronto in the street names). Even the old beard himself, Walt Whitman, helped establish Fort Greene Park, where just this morning I was sweating in the hellish humidity. From that vantage point, Wally could see the Manhattan skyline, and no doubt the passenger ferries that scuttled back and forth from there to the rump of Long Island, immortalized in his <i>Crossing Brooklyn Ferry.</i><br />
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<i>Crowds of men and women attired in the usual costumes, how curious</i><br />
<i> you are to me!</i><br />
<i>On the ferry-boats the hundreds and hundreds that cross, returning</i><br />
<i> home, are more curious to me than you suppose,</i><br />
<i>And you that shall cross from shore to shore years hence are more to</i><br />
<i> me, and more in my mediations, than you might </i><br />
<i> suppose.*</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
Oh, Walt, you clever dog. Nothing extends the shelflife of a poem like a shout-out to your future readers. Your poem has outlived the ferry itself, replaced by the bridge of Moore's lesser-known poem "Granite and Steel," which now has a fancy bike lane and a new pedestrian park, in the construction of which no workers gave their lives -- a fact that doesn't detract from the appeal of the thing one bit, its equal parts rationality and romance intact:<br />
<br />
<i>Untried expedient, untried; then tried; <br />
way out; way in; romantic passageway <br />
first seen by the eye of the mind, <br />
then by the eye. O steel! O stone! </i><br />
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More recently, my little corner of the borough has housed and homed the likes of Colson Whitehead, Jhumpa Lahiri, Jennifer Egan, Nelson George and Amitav Ghosh. While I can't say I've met these people personally, I probably wouldn't recognize them if I had, and besides, I prefer to read writers' work than see their faces. (For those who prefer the latter, there are some stalkerish Google maps that pinpoint the addresses of Brooklyn literati like the Foers, Lethems, Krausses et al, but you won't find a link to it here.)<br />
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To that end, I have been frequenting my local indie bookstore, <a href="http://abookstoreinbrooklyn.blogspot.com/">Greenlight</a>, and have left with goodies made in Fort Greene like Whitehead's <i>The Colossus of New York</i> (which, to those sensitive to cadence, is alternately waves and elephants crashing on the beach) and <i>Sag Harbor, </i>Egan's<i> Look at Me,</i> poet Laureate Tina Chang's <i>Half-Lit Houses, </i>Lorrie Moore's <i>Birds of America </i>and <i>Anagrams </i>(I know, I'm slow) as well as some other thematic curiosities like Ferlinghetti's <i>A Coney Island of the Mind</i>.<br />
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<b>Pop quid pro quo:</b> Who are your favourite Brooklyn writers, or favourite novels/poems/stories of New York? I really have nothing better to do than to read them. <br />
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*My pretty 1960 paperback Rinehart & Co. edition of <i>Leaves of Grass</i> is marked New York - Toronto, further proof of Whitman's foresight.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-36119456982842391612010-06-24T11:59:00.006-04:002010-06-24T14:18:01.419-04:00Degrees of separationRepeated immigration is an effective way to mark the passage of time. I know exactly where I was and what I was doing in November, 2001, September, 2003, August, 2007, and so on, and gauge everything else by those markers -- including how long it's been since I, say, watched a <a href="http://www.eurovision.tv/page/home">Eurovision Song Contest</a> live on television. Caught up like the rest of Finland in the worldwide phenomenon that was <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdItwaLrv1U">Lordi</a>, I had even gone so far as to break my moratorium on freelancing (copywriting is overpaid and makes you lazy) and pitch the continental explosion of unabashed nationalistic fervour and bad taste to a magazine back home (they didn't bite).<br />
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So I'm ashamed to say that what with all the recent excitement, I entirely forgot about Euroviisut (as the Finns say) until I cracked open my copy of the <span style="font-style: italic;">New Yorker</span> (shut up) this morning to find a fucking hilarious article on this year's contest by Anthony Lane. A taste:<br />
<blockquote>"A deranged Estonian pianist smacked his keyboard with one raised fist, like a butcher flattening an escalope of veal. A pair of ice-white blondes, one with a squeezebox, decided to revive the moribund tradition of oompah-pah--or presumably, because they were Finnish, oom-päa-päa [sic]. A Belgian boy came on to croon 'Me and My Guitar,' otherwise known as 'Him and His Crippling Delusion....A smirking Serb of indeterminate gender, wearing a tailcoat, sang flat, hiccupping now and then for dramatic effect. Order was at first restored by Marcin Mrozinski, from Poland, who was backed by five demure women in national dress, and then destroyed as two of the women tore the white blouse off the third, to reveal a sort of peasant boob tube. An old Eurovision trick, this: the mid-song strip, timed to coincide with musical fatigue."</blockquote>I could go on. Of course, Lane is British, and states this from the outset, because while people there feel about it much like I imagine Americans feel about, say, White Castle, a disgusting yet irresistible part of their national landscape, it is absolutely verboten for anybody outside the EU to diss Eurovision. All the same, the Brits are EV snobs, and, oh, never mind. The whole point of this (just typed "pint") is to say that I'm realizing how this move to the U.S. feels like I'm one step farther away from Finland, where, by the time I left, I'd spent as much time as in my precious Toronto. Adding to the uncanny effect is the media buyout of this (June 28) issue of the <i>New Yorker</i> by Canadian advertisers, to draw attention north to the G8, an event that is, IMHO, even more ridiculous than Eurovision.<br />
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One of the things people ask when they learn I lived in a foreign-speaking country for that long is, How is your Finnish these days? While based in sheer interest (or politesse), surely, for me it's a humiliating question: given that I have occasion to use Finnish outside Finland approximately once a year, when addressing Christmas cards to family there, "my Finnish" is suffering. I've resorted to carrying around my Finnish-English dictionaries, each of which weighs approximately as much as a two-year-old human child, from apartment to apartment as penance, in hopes of maybe coming across a word that needs translating.<br />
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Even Mr. O is losing the Finnish fever that attacked him so near-fatally in our first years in Toronto (to be fair, he did admit he would rather have made such a move as a younger man, before he was so set in his ways). Over the last few months, with New York on the horizon, he made overtures to our future return to Toronto, or Canada in general, a permanent settlement which he once in an argument accused me of holding behind my back like a secret plot or an ace of spades. I offered to put it in writing that such plot did not exist, and that Finland was certainly a first choice should we ever have kids that needed to be educated, for instance. I mean, who could deny a child such a cultural cornucopia as the lyrics to Latvia's 2010 entry "What For?":<br />
<span style="font-style: italic;"></span><br />
<blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">I've asked my Uncle Joe</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">But he can't speak</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">Why does the wind still blow?</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">And blood still leaks?</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">So many questions now</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">With no reply</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">What for do people live until they die?</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">...</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">Only Mr. God knows why</span><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">(But) His phone today is out of range.</span></blockquote>In closing I'd like to announce that Mr. O got his SSN card yesterday, which brings with it many happy things including a paycheck and a large dose of relief that somehow motivated me to start up this blog again after thinking about it for weeks. We're going to celebrate by getting blasted on vodka and eating meatballs and herring with a good Finnish friend at a Nordic restaurant tomorrow night, in honour of Juhannus or midsummer, an unforgettable Finnish holiday. Kippis.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-90084vK5AYz0FlUNnkuDi8xpNmCpH02iJ8PnPFNRtqo2HFbdBZp_J8tPi6XNJLAlmkK1zBVjdiHuSD9Y-glYkCwEJOU-6G3DwqUzxwhomJPJz0eaDuXu62v2gG8bN9pNA9ocYi2fg8E/s1600/1748110-400_lihapulla.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5486385969139050482" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-90084vK5AYz0FlUNnkuDi8xpNmCpH02iJ8PnPFNRtqo2HFbdBZp_J8tPi6XNJLAlmkK1zBVjdiHuSD9Y-glYkCwEJOU-6G3DwqUzxwhomJPJz0eaDuXu62v2gG8bN9pNA9ocYi2fg8E/s320/1748110-400_lihapulla.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; height: 196px; width: 320px;" /></a>Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-78318310119951963952010-06-23T17:12:00.004-04:002010-06-23T17:58:57.807-04:00After all that, aliens<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmvCLYA1wYQpKMD18KLZnDOsQ_1pMfqB51GXSYfZfIxFJZjp64TQrH_XmWQ8PK1xpgC52jZ4VuXiF_cn0c1lhj5WbPc89Whun5aQ3fr7Gs7eSfiUdqC4vdJWu97fc4cBPgARvdMj63gwo/s1600/P1050007.JPG"><img style="float: left; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 180px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmvCLYA1wYQpKMD18KLZnDOsQ_1pMfqB51GXSYfZfIxFJZjp64TQrH_XmWQ8PK1xpgC52jZ4VuXiF_cn0c1lhj5WbPc89Whun5aQ3fr7Gs7eSfiUdqC4vdJWu97fc4cBPgARvdMj63gwo/s320/P1050007.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5486087825626993090" border="0" /></a><br />As may be evidenced by my six-month absence from this blog, I've never been one to sit still. So after almost three years in Canada, we have up and moved to the one place I never thought I'd live.<br /><br /><br /><br />It was a hard decision, really. We were getting pretty comfy in Toronto, moved into a three-bedroom place in the west end, had a few <a href="http://torontopoetryvendors.wordpress.com/">excellent</a> <a href="http://pivotreadings.wordpress.com/">projects</a> underway, when Mr. O gets a call -- or tweet, as is the fashion these days -- from an agency in New York City. It was a great opportunity for him, <a href="http://www.rga.com/">a shop with a spotless reputation</a> and a position that he'd been looking for all over TO and never managed to find. It also meant I could quit my admittedly solid, even promising but not perfect, full-time job and step off into the unknown, a prospect which, since I'd turned 30, had been lingering in the back of my mind but that I'd never have the guts to do without a good hard kick in the ass.<br /><br />On the other hand, we were -- and are -- highly suspicious of the piss-poor health care system, unregulated work hours, and all the uprooting and postponing of our regularly scheduled lives that such a move would entail. I've been to New York often enough to see through the glamorous black patent sheen to the rats and poverty beneath. I am too old for clubs and too poor for fashion. And I had worked to build wonderful, amazing, inspiring friendships and a future in Toronto that make up for any non-Big-Apple-ness of that city.<br /><br />I was and am incredibly proud of Mr. O for being recruited, and from the outset promised to support him if he decided he wanted to follow the dream job. Even if we didn't stay, it is the kind of thing that pimps a CV forever. Even my mom didn't say "Don't go." So after months of late-night debating, lurking on Craigslist, swearing at lawyers (behind their backs, natch), Skype courting, an intense day of in-person interviews, a botched counter-offer from a Toronto firm which shall remain nameless, a few surprise coups, one brief crying bout, two resignations, two permits and a tequila-soaked layer cake of farewell parties, we put our furniture in storage, packed up a U-haul, force-fed the cats some Baby Gravol and hit the road. In a torrential downpour. At 1 a.m.<br /><br />The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewiston-Queenston_Bridge">border</a> was a breeze, deserted and creepy at 3 a.m. We had an inventory of goods, health certificates for the cats, a questionable liquor limit, but the staff were more concerned with staying dry to worry about scrubbed yessir kids like us. Thankfully too, because our ragamuffin cat Layla started puking in her carrier before we left Toronto city limits, and by the time we got to the New York border was drooling and moaning and foaming at the mouth like Cujo. (Nota bene: when the vet says test out the Gravol beforehand, test it out.) We eventually threw a jacket over the two of them -- Moyo was relatively unbothered by the whole thing! -- which seemed to help.<br /><br />On the New York side, the frequency of Tim Hortons franchises made us wonder if we'd really left Canada. Weak and sentimental, I ordered one last small double-double in a sad, shuttered, pothole-riddled and totally soaked roadside attraction manned by a lobotomized teenage blonde. The magical disembodied GPS man carried us pretty much the whole way, despite a minor cock-up that took us on and off the toll-road a few times and right through the centre of Syracuse during morning rush hour. <br /><br />The drive south from Syracuse was surprisingly scenic, winding through a valley where the Susquehanna river meets the Chenango. South of Binghampton the view was marred by the incredible amount of roadkill; I think I counted 15 dead deer from there through Pennsylvania. We waved hello to Dunder Mifflin and veered east again, blasting the radio and the AC to keep ourselves awake as the traffic got thicker and faster. We survived Jersey, made it through the Holland Tunnel, along Canal and across the Manhattan bridge to Brooklyn. Home. For now.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-83503325662741296752009-11-13T10:55:00.003-05:002009-11-13T11:01:29.191-05:00Canada, manly monarchist country?The current Canadian administration is obviously compensating for something. Its new guide for immigrants who wish to become citizens of our apparently overly femmy, tree-hugging land, <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/22475907/Discover-Canada">Discover Canada</a>, puts a heavy emphasis on characteristics most people had assumed had gone out with disposable dresses and EZ Bake ovens, stuff like The Queen and the (glory days of the) Canadian military. That oughta make them feel right at home.<br /><br />I say we make our own guide, where the Queen lives at Church and Wellesley and the military is largely found recovering from PTSD in hospitals across the country, with substandard social and health benefits. Hey, if people are going to go through the trouble of moving here and getting a passport, the least we can do is be honest with them.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-9657258132831351932009-11-12T16:12:00.002-05:002009-11-12T16:16:48.859-05:00No pay no wayThe Ontario Court of Appeal has <a href="http://www.ontariocourts.on.ca/decisions/2009/november/2009ONCA0794.htm">ruled</a> that sponsors are not automatically responsible for debts incurred via their immigratory (?) sponsored relatives social support, the <span style="font-style: italic;">Globe and Mail</span> reported today. Instead, sponsors should be given a moment to explain themselves, in the name of procedural fairness.<br /><br />I'm all in favour of fairness, but it's not like sponsored aren't warned ahead of time. I was beaten over the head with reminders about the potential costs of sponsoring Mr. O.<br /><br />A way to reduce this cost to the governments (the benefits of immigration notwithstanding) is to provide new immigrants with an open work permit, so they can, you know, get a job while waiting 24 months for their papers to come through. Just sayin'.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-87703541949790803362009-08-18T21:04:00.002-04:002009-08-18T21:13:19.986-04:00Cold hard cardMr. O got a telltale envelope in the mail today: his PR card. Was it worth the wait? Well, I'm glad you asked. Here are some facts about the Canadian PR card, described by Captain David Myers of the Florida State Fraud ID Unit as "the most secure ID document in the world today" or as I like to call it, "the Ferrari of cards."<br /><br />Justification for this claim, unashamedly pasted from a <a href="http://www.lasercard.com/files/Canada%20PRC%20Case%20Study_102808lr.pdf">handy LaserCard two-pager</a>:<br /><blockquote>Following a several year evaluation, the LaserCard® Optical Memory Card was selected for this ID card application, based primarily on the following advantages:<br />1. High Data Capacity: The 1.1 megabyte optical stripe holds securely all required cardholder information, and can be updated as needed in the future.<br />2. Cost effectiveness: The LaserCard provides interoperability, future flexibility and growth, tamperproof data storage, durability, and long life.<br />3. High level of security: The PRC protects the privacy of the cardholder better than the previous IMM 1000 paper form it replaces. Secure information is stored digitally on the optical memory and cannot be erased or fraudulently altered. The optical stripe includes overt, covert and forensic security features and is irreversibly marked with the embedded hologram eye-visible likeness of the cardholder.<br />4. Durability: As part of the new Canadian PRC 5-year life-time requirement, the LaserCard® was tested and met all stringent durability standards tests as conducted by independent laboratory, Battelle Test Labs of Ohio. Success in the 10-year lifetime U.S. Green Card, and Border Crossing Card programs gave added assurance to the Canadian government.<br />5. Compatibility: The LaserCard complies with a full suite of inter national technology and application standards, including those defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The Canadian PRC was the first optical memory card to fully comply with ICAO standards for optical memory-based travel cards.<br />6. Interoperability: Sharing the same technology foundation as the U.S. Green Card and Border Crossing Card, the new Canadian PRC is compatible with U.S. inspection systems and vice versa as part of the U.S./Canada Smart Border Accord. Global interoperability is assured by courtesy of the Logical Data Structure Technical Report first published by ICAO and subsequently as<br />an information exchange standard by ISO.<br />7. Flexibility: Optical memory card meets the need for certain card authentication, positive ID, and a future growth path. </blockquote>Phew. Wasn't that impressive? And for the icing, some Facts at a Glance:<br /><blockquote>• Implemented in June 2002, and by October 2008, more than 2.5 million cards issued<br />• Canadian PRC awarded prestigious International Card Manufacturers Association (ICMA) 2003 Élan Award for Technical Achievement<br />• Judged the most secure card in the world by independent forensic document specialist<br />• Interoperable with U.S. Green Card and Border Crossing Card</blockquote>There. Mr. O now has a Ferrari in his wallet. Looking at it from that point of view, it was a bargain.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-86197293710930681792009-07-21T22:49:00.005-04:002009-08-03T20:48:30.185-04:00LandedThis morning we drove to Etobicoke, where Mr. O became a permanent resident. They sent him a letter which said "Decision granted" as of June 29 - and I still love the cryptic-elliptic bureaucratic style of these little missives, which, however, I shan't miss.<br /><br />But aren't you curious what the interview was like? Imagining <span style="font-style: italic;">Green Card</span> with Gerard Depardieu and that woman from the L'Oreal commercials? Yeah, it was kind of like that, or at least it was in my head on the way there - I was inexplicably nervous about the whole thing and even suggested we practice the basic facts about our relationship. Alas, we got to the office right at 8 a.m., which was the time of our "appointment" according to the letter, at which point we realized of course there was no appointment, or rather that everybody had the same appointment, because we sat down in what turned out to be not enough chairs in a wide room with a very, very low ceiling and circa 1969 ceiling tiles.<br /><br />The Venetian blinds whip up on cubby 3 and an invisible male voice starts calling out names. He's no pro and the mic keeps cutting out but eventually the first lucky PR catches on and goes up to the window. And, uh, proceeds to complete the whole interview over the mic. "Do you have any children outside Canada? Do you have any criminal record here? Have you ever been deported? Oh you have? How did you like that?" etc. Repeat about 12 times before Mr. O got his turn and heads up, by which point other cubby holes are flapping and people are crowding around the chairs...He waves me over and the invisible voice actually has a young friendly, maybe French Canadian face and he addresses me by name and reminds me of my three-year responsibility as sponsor. He asks the immi (I can still call him the immi, can't I?) the same questions in the same cracking mic voice and then has Mr. O check his vital info and sign inside the green box and he sticks the photo on and Congratulations! You are now a permanent resident of Canada. You can sponsor your family. Call OHIP and tell them your status has changed. He gave him a piece of paper he will need when he applies for Old Age Pension. I heard previous generations cackle like gobbledy ghosts in my ears at that one.<br /><br />Sigh. He made it all sound so fancy. Then he says, "we're going to get you a new SIN number so go sit down and one of my colleagues will call you up in a few minutes." So we plop back down I beg off to go get my coffee from the car and come back to find a horrible child has taken my seat and Mr. O is still waiting...and finally he is beckoned to window 5 and she pronounces his name perfectly and all minor nitpicks and blemishes are overlooked because now he's a Canadian like the rest of us. Or will be in approximately four weeks when the card arrives; for now don't leave the country or there could be trouble. Phew.<br /><br />And then he calls CIC to try and get his open work permit application - which he had to file in case the PR didn't come through in time - cancelled and they've changed the system to amke ti 35 times harder to get a real live person than it was before and he finally gets one and they put him on hold and then the line is disconnected. And all this before lunch.<br /><br />Cheers to Mr. O for hanging in there, and specifically for not leaving me and hightailing it back to Finland, where you can always get a real person on the line, even the taxman. I love you.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-57287089650383429502009-05-13T10:54:00.003-04:002009-05-13T10:56:28.544-04:00Final stretchThe criminal check arrived safe and sound today (despite a mysterious and unwarranted name change from Mr. O to Mr. W ?!?), which means we have a month or so to get it under the nose of the right person at CIC, who will hopefully waive the need for a renewal of Mr. O's work permit before the permanent residency is official. So we can have some summer. 'N' stuff.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-62567525609769924712009-05-05T21:29:00.003-04:002009-05-05T21:53:21.071-04:00Halfway homeOur woman in Abu Dhabi sent the papers back by FedEx today, so Mr. O should have his certificate of good conduct in a week or so. It only took us six months to pull it all together. And while I'm not celebrating yet - I wouldn't trust FedEx with my compost - it feels good to be one step closer to ending this entire ordeal. The ungrateful immigrant is grateful today for friends, and friends of friends.<br /><br />Now if we get those documents to CIC before his work permit expires in June, hopefully he won't have to apply for another one before he gets his permanent residency. Hard to believe it's taken us almost two years to get to this point (I remember being outraged at the thought of nine months), and during that time the process has alternated between albatross and minor annoyance. The joke is, we don't know where we'll end up. I was talking to a friend yesterday who is planning to move to the UK, about the hassles of immigration, and how you are heavier than you think - the modern life is full of baggage. Already in the time we've been here we have accumulated so much stuff, and it all weighs on you and makes it that much harder to just pick up again. It would be easy to stay, like sleeping in on a Monday morning.<br /><br />But on more than one occasion, many courtesy of an immigration-inspired frustration, Mr. O has declared that he's not staying here permanently. So it's possible we're going through all of this for nothing. We're lucky, we have options.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-60957422376986636182009-04-30T10:11:00.002-04:002009-04-30T10:27:30.499-04:00Strange loveEvil, predatory foreigners who marry Canadians for the holy grail of a residence visa seem to be the immigration fear du jour in the media <span style="text-decoration: underline;"></span> these days...Not that I don't feel sympathy for <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090430.wlmarriage30art1743/BNStory/lifeFamily/">these</a> <a href="http://www2.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/city/story.html?k=60870&id=07964313-3ad9-428f-81eb-05147d6a8a0f">women</a>, but it's not like they didn't know the risks when they signed up for sponsorship.<br /><br />The larger problem seems to be the weird imbalance in the spousal sponsorship system, in which one spouse becomes financially responsible for the other's potential misfortune. Never mind the opportunities it creates for weasels and cheaters, who have all responsibility lifted off their shoulders by the government (score!). It puts a strange, archaic twist on even those genuine relationships - in which both partners have good intentions - and ultimately has to be supplemented with a private agreement between the partners that they'll work it out - and pay it off - together if things go south. Y'know, a marriage. For the CIC to try to play it otherwise is pretty much asking for trouble. <br /><br />Even worse: the <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090320.wcopoly23/BNStory/lifeFamily/">polygamists are coming</a>! Ahhhhh!Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-35593818683928166282009-04-08T11:01:00.002-04:002009-04-08T11:06:48.423-04:00Tax this immigrantMr. O and I did our taxes this week and were feeling pretty smart about it, thanks very much. But we paused when we realized that Mr. O pays CPP and EI fees - to the max, in fact - that he is himself <a href="http://www.cic.gc.ca/English/immigrate/sponsor/spouse-apply-who.asp">ineligible to receive</a>.<br /><br />Hmm, maybe immigrants aren't such a drain on our precious system after all...ahem.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-88363810763701704682009-04-06T10:18:00.002-04:002009-04-06T10:23:42.636-04:00Success, with a twistAn update from our woman in UAE:<br /><br />"Just letting you know that I went to the Ministry of Interior today (apparently they changed which department handles these forms), and submitted them. I have the mobile number of the agent, and he said I can come pick it up when it is ready. Will let you know when I pick it up...so far so good!"<br /><br />This woman managed to do in 3 days what a professional, multinational courier service failed to do in 3 months. Am seeking out online flower and gift basket delivery as we speak...Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-30889252968664698312009-04-05T20:13:00.002-04:002009-04-05T20:26:23.736-04:00Happy to be hereThe travel bug that had me going for nearly a decade seems to have entered some kind of cocooning phase, because I have absolutely no desire for transatlantic travel these days. Call me crazy, but my top five world destinations at the mo are the T&T Supermarket on Cherry Street, the Toronto Zoo, Prince Edward County, Quebec City and That Place in New Brunswick with the Giant Plaster of Paris Lobster (there's at least one).<br /><br />The farthest I can imagine flying - and really I could skip flying altogether as I crave a stick shift and four wheels at the moment like a pregnant woman craves pickles - is Cuba, and somebody else would probably have to pay my ticket to drag me that far. Don't believe me? I have to go to France for work this summer and right now I'd rather stay home and watch <span style="font-style: italic;">Law and Order</span>...I don't know what's come over me. Or how about this: Mr. O is going back to Finland for a family party in May - by himself. I'm tempted to claim some great blast of eco-consciousness or blame it on the recession but in all honesty I am far more interested in travelling in Canada right now than anywhere else. I'm excited about roadside fruit stands, campsites with historical plaques, and motels with carpet on the walls.<br /><br />Perhaps I'm reverting to my North American landlocked ways. And, since it may very well be temporary, I'm enjoying it. Now where is that road atlas...Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-58221795257954880542009-04-05T20:07:00.002-04:002009-04-05T20:30:02.941-04:00So far, so good...Laura emailed on Friday to say she'd received the package and will take care of it early next week (which there means Sat - Thurs). I am very eager to find out if this DIY tactic works...and how long it takes after she delivers it (fingers crossed) for them to get the certificate back to us. Mr. O's work permit expires in June, which means we'll have to get the certificate to the CIC well before then.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-62115438487206986752009-03-28T12:02:00.003-04:002009-03-28T12:29:41.726-04:00It's who you knowWe spent two months wondering what would come of <a href="http://ungratefulimmigrant.blogspot.com/2009/01/touchdown.html">our begging letter</a> to CIC to waive the requirement for the Emirati police certificate. It wasn't so unreasonable: Mr. O had lived in the country for exactly one month longer than the six-month exemption, and had a total of two speeding tickets (goes with the territory over there, mom) on his record. We had tried to deliver it according to the instructions provided, and failed. It was worth a try.<br /><br />Of course, they didn't go for it. I wasn't surprised by that. What surprised me was the near-illiteracy of the response we received. First, the letter was a cut and paste from the CIC site, and the crucial sentence, the sentence that informed us that our request was denied, was actually missing the word "denied." Lucky we both have good grasp of English (something so easily taken for granted, but that should never be when dealing with immigrants), we managed to intuit that much.<br /><br />What made me really angry though was that the author of the letter (identified only by a code number) didn't seem to have a great grasp of English him- or herself. In "clarifying" the instructions for us once more, they had attached a print out of a page from the CIC site, which instructs the applicant to get the fingerprints, etc. legalized at the Emirati embassy in Ottawa - highlighting this part and actually telling us to send the application package there instead. This is just wrong, wrong, wrong. Anyone who had any comprehension of subordinate clauses (and working for the government you'd think that would be prerequisite number 3 or 4 at least) would see that the documents which were notarized by the Embassy were then to be shipped off to the UAE. Either out of sloppiness or sheer illiteracy, our "helpful" CIC fuckwit was sending us down a path to ruin, or at least to failure to get the documents in before Mr. O has to apply for another open work permit in June.<br /><br />I wasn't having it. It was obvious that we weren't going to be successful by Canadian methods - it was going to require some special effort. The UAE site had a suggestion: to find a "friend" who lived there who could deliver the papers for us. "Friend" means a) male b) Arabic-speaking and c) possessed of half a brain and a little resilience. Unfortunately, Mr. O's former employer no longer had an office down there, and we had no way of reaching their former fixer. I started looking online for a lawyer in the UAE who could act on our behalf, or at least recommend someone who could, but Mr. O balked at the potential fees (he is, at this point, entirely fed up with the cost of this whole endeavour), and the need for early morning phone calls was too much for us.<br /><br />I sent out messages to the two or three people I knew with connections there, and put out an APB on Facebook. Within a week I had heard back from a Finnish couple who also worked for the same company, a Danish friend of mine now living back in Copenhagen, and a friend of a friend who was working down there at the time. This last one, we'll call her Laura, has a few friends who might fit the bill, so we wrote her up a big letter last weekend and sent everything down there to her on Monday. If that doesn't work out we'll try the alternatives, because we have options now. After feeling a bit amputated it's very good to have friends come to your aid. We knew from the very start that this part wasn't going to be easy.<br /><br />We also heard from a few unexpected sources, like a friend we've only known here, who, it turns out, lived in the UAE as a child, and still has family in the country. Even after a year and a half of Finns coming out of the woodwork, it still surprises me when I make connections to these tiny places. A constant reminder that we are not on our own.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-4639617381318514162009-01-22T22:39:00.002-05:002009-01-22T22:42:40.930-05:00Our man in academeA friend put me on to <a href="http://www.utoronto.ca/ethnicstudies/reitz.html">Jeffrey Reitz</a> today, who's a prof in ethnic, immigration and pluralism studies at the University of Toronto. The rumour is he conducted a study into the CIC processing centre in Vegreville, AB, and found rampant racial discrimination and probably the bones of small animals and god knows what else. I am hunting for it and shall post it here when found.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-69063538762488242072009-01-22T22:28:00.003-05:002009-01-22T22:39:23.809-05:00TouchdownSo they tried to deliver <a href="http://ungratefulimmigrant.blogspot.com/2009/01/fedex-nightmare.html">the effing package</a> one more time, and one more time it was rejected, apparently by security guards who rejected the package on the grounds that it had to be addressed to a particular person, who shall remain a mystery, at least for the time being. I'm thinking back to Karri's phone call with someone at the Abu Dhabi police station there, who couldn't give us a name "because there were several people" it could go to and am wondering if we were lax in our investigations or if there really is some kind of broken link somewhere. I'm assuming that other people have successfully gotten their documentation through, and then back, so probably a bit of both.<br /><br />At any rate, the FedEx tracking status sprung back into motion and we could follow the stupid thing across Sharjah and so on right up to our door today, and it's waiting for us at the FedEx depot, hopefully with some flowers and a big I'm sorry. <br /><br />So Mr. O is now writing a letter to the CIC explaining the entire debacle and including photocopies of the documents, and hoping they can come to some kind of solution, on a case by case basis, as they say. My fear is that this is going to set back the entire process even more than it has been already, and June isn't really that far away, in immigration years (kind of like cat years, or is it dog years?). At this point the whole thing has become a kind of irritation in what is otherwise a very normal life, so in a way I feel cheated, as if we've kept our end of the bargain by being good consumer citizens and getting jobs and paying taxes and doing all of that shit, and these formalities are just here to make us older before our time.<br /><br />And the same goes on the CIC's end: with all the issues of immigrant integration and wasted skills and poverty and systemic racism within the system (more on that later), I'm highly doubtful that they are going to do more but ask that we send it all again, and we'll be stuck in the kind of feedback loop that I have to assume accounts for all the 46-month long unresolved cases on <a href="http://www.trackitt.com/">Trackitt</a>. Freaky.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-56685677073066481182009-01-14T19:32:00.002-05:002009-01-14T19:45:03.138-05:00Breaking pointToday we woke up on a mission. I called FedEx and had a heart-to-heart with the random call centre guy, who gave us the same "update" from Dec 14, and promised to have somebody call us back about it asap. I told him if somebody actually called me back, I would fall off my chair. Then when I got to work I wrote a strongly worded letter and faxed it to FedEx HQ in Mississauga. Mr. O, meanwhile, was on the phone with the CIC, trying to ascertain just how we would go about completing his immigration process sans Emirati Certificate of Good Conduct.<br /><br />Lo and behold, somebody from FedEx called him back this afternoon, somebody with a name AND a private extension. They told him they would call Abu Dhabi to establish the whereabouts of the package (which Mr. O has all but accepted as lost by this point) and either attempt to redeliver it or send it back to us. Mr. O also asked for a letter explaining the reasons it couldn't be delivered, if that turned out to be the case, and/or the reasons for its disappearance, for the sake of a consolation prize for the CIC.<br /><br />This miniature shitstorm, after months of laissez-faire neglect of my blog and our little experiment, has started me thinking about breaking points. We are all trained to have faith in these little institutions (like mail) and when they break down, I for one am incredulous, until it becomes clear that if I don't do something about it, nobody will. This no doubt makes me spoiled, as spoiled as anybody used to paying money to have things done for me by others. It's a shock when this doesn't happen, or when the system breaks down. And yet, when it does, really there's nothing in place here to help us out. No consumer advocate, no 6 'o clock ass-kicking camera-toting watchdog. Nobody really gives a damn.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-73234190426279745792009-01-14T00:07:00.003-05:002009-01-14T00:15:46.022-05:00FedEx nightmareWe are caught in a FedEx purgatory: the documents haven't been delivered, and yet they haven't been returned. The minimum-wage morons at the FedEx 1-800 number (oh yes, morons is kind) are alternately outrageously unhelpful and outright rude and defensive. It's been over a month now, and we've gotten exactly zero answers for our trouble. I am ready to kick some serious courier ass.<br /><br />Of course, if they're lost, there's nothing we can do. It would be a huge relief at this point just to get them back. And considering the $150 we paid for the delivery, we've got jack squat from the courier company. (One relatively nice but equally useless moron told us the package was sitting at the AD end, waiting for an account number to be charged to ship them back. Um, another $150? I smell a scam.) Problem is, according to the CIC website, the papers must be delivered by courier, and nobody else is returning our phone calls. Welcome to the black hole. Knowing Abu Dhabi bureaucracy, I doubt that anybody knows what the hell is going on.<br /><br />Which is fine, sure, I have no use for those documents anyway. It's not like we forked over a couple hundred bucks and spent several months collecting them. It's not like they're crucial to Mr. O's immigration or anything. We'll just call up the CIC and explain, and they'll just waive the whole police thing (really it was just a test of our commitment, to show we really care).Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-84792242725568521042008-12-01T08:33:00.002-05:002008-12-01T08:41:53.071-05:00Express my assMr. O is having great fun trying to obtain his certificate of good conduct from the U.A.E. police. Here's a taste: The only system of addresses in Abu Dhabi for mail is a P.O. box system. When you live there you get in a taxi and say "Hyundai Showroom," not "123 Main Street." Street addresses are a relative science, and that's just the way it is. Hence the P.O boxes.<br /><br />However, FedEx express courier ($150 worth, neveryoumind) requires a signature to deliver a package, so dropping it in the P.O. Box isn't apparently an option. They called Mr. O on Saturday after trying to deliver it three times (Thursday, Friday, Saturday), asking if there was any other number they could try. Of course, Thursday afternoon and Friday are known as The Weekend in that part of the world, and it would appear that there's some kind of larger holiday going on, which would explain the inability to get through. Why they don't just get the janitor to sign it and drop it in the PO box is beyond me.<br /><br />The bitch of it is, this is the last piece we need for his PR application to be complete, and it's already taken six months, including our own procrastination. Once we got the OWP we were, as far as daily life goes, home free, but now I'd really just like to get the damn thing over with and get on with my life. We have no idea how long the processing will take on their end, but if delivery itself is this complicated...well, inshallah the rest of it is less of a gong show.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-67948462852970613042008-08-15T10:50:00.003-04:002008-08-15T11:02:35.359-04:00Dog daysWe've gotten pretty complacent these last few months, since Mr. O's open work permit came in. It is summer after all, and at this point any official accreditation he gets feels like just more paperwork and rubber stamping - our quality of life won't change much from here to there - which only serves to underline my basic argument that spouses of citizens should be granted open work permits from the outset, and the system would run a lot smoother for everyone. This blog probably wouldn't exist.<br /><br />So in true summer fashion I'm not only lazy with posting but also with following what's been going on in <a href="http://ungratefulimmigrant.blogspot.com/2008/06/time-off-for-good-conduct.html">the latest round in our little immigration game</a>: Mr. O got his legalized fingerprint form back from the U.A.E. embassy in Ottawa last week, and so he'll now have to send that and a copy of his old residence permit and passport to the Ministry of Interior in Dubai. There are also some fees which he needs to "contact them" about - and the site is also a bit vague on the timelines, as they recommend getting "a friend" in Dubai to help you out with the forms to speed up the process. When we lived there Mr. O's Finnish employer had a local Arabic-speaking fixer to take care of such things, but we have no such connection now.<br /><br />Of course, with all our easy summer dawdling, the permanent residency process is delayed even further - nothing will move until he gets his <a href="http://www.uae-embassy.com/uae-certificate.html">certificate of good conduct</a> back from the Emirati government and into the hands of the CIC.<br /><span style=";font-family:";" ><span style="color:red;"></span></span><br />He also has to renew his OHIP card, which he tried to do the other day but there must have been some kind of big deadline because the line at Service Canada was out the door, so he'll have to go back. Wouldn't it be nice if the government's many heads could talk to each other, and they could confirm that his permit had been extended (say, in a database somewhere) and just mail him a new card? Because lines suck, especially in August.<br /><br />Tra la la la, off to the cottage...Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-14301549383551007922008-07-21T12:35:00.004-04:002008-08-15T11:04:21.840-04:00I heart Heather Mallick<a href="http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/06/27/f-vp-mallick.html">CBC columnista extraordinaire Heather Mallick</a> pulls a strip off the hairy back of Canadian propaganda aimed at new and prospective immigrants by equating <a href="http://www.cic.gc.ca/EnGLIsh/resources/publications/look/index.asp">this booklet</a> with a national personals ad. God dammit woman, could you be more brilliant?<br /><br />Case in point:<br /><blockquote>I rather adore Canada, and at times when I am at Wickaninnish in British Columbia or skiing at Lake Louise, Alta., or eating Nova Scotia oysters or drinking a Bloody Caesar (Canadian invention), I am actively in love with it. But at no time do I think we are God's gift to humanity. What arse would say it, or worse, believe it?</blockquote>And again:<br /><blockquote>The booklet says Canadian values include equality (ask Muslim-Canadians now regularly referred to in newspapers as "brown-skinned"), freedom (ask a pregnant woman running the Christian-right gauntlet at a Fredericton abortion clinic), peacekeeping (ask a soldier fighting a pointless war in Afghanistan), and law and order (ask those Muslim-Canadian teenagers on trial for terrorism instead of adolescence).</blockquote><br />And again:<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>For the sky is always blue as a jay in this land of moral and personable people devoted to their "parliamentary democracy," unstinting in their "environmentally sound" stewardship of the "clean and prosperous" country that their children will live in, speaking as one in their respect for "cultural differences" and their faith in "international peacekeeping."</p> <p>No, seriously.</p> <p>I'm not mocking the federal government's rendition of national perfection for the vulnerable immigrants most likely to fall for it. I understand the impulse. Canada needs skilled immigrants. It's the economic version of dating angst like, "Gosh, if we could just hook up with an emerging tech nation who has relatives who do plumbing on the side."</p></blockquote><p></p>Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5887281494330347748.post-7166242076022665042008-07-08T20:34:00.003-04:002008-08-15T11:05:07.289-04:00Bring on the open workBetween six and seven weeks <a href="http://ungratefulimmigrant.blogspot.com/2008/05/down-with-owp.html">later</a>, Mr. O's open work permit arrived today. This means he can quit his job and/or take another one without having to reapply. It's good for one year. Yeah! (He had a bit of a scare, actually, in that he almost let his residence permit expire before getting his OWP application in. Tip: always have one ball in play.)<br /><br />In other permit news, his application to get a police report from the U.A.E. is moving more slowly. Actually it hasn't moved anywhere since the <a href="http://ungratefulimmigrant.blogspot.com/2008/06/525-finger.html">fingerprints</a>; it's sitting on our kitchen table. But what the hell, it's summer. Anyone with half a soul can't do paperwork in the summertime. Ciao.Careygirlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17629149366092185523noreply@blogger.com0