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We've been in Canada for a week now, and still have to pinch ourselves when we realise that our four years of planning and persisting have paid off. Here's how the journey went for us: We left Cape Town at the end of October, and took a two-week trip in a camper van up to my folks in JHB. After another two weeks of blissful family time, my mom's church driver took us to the airport in a van. My dad followed in his own car to help us through baggage check, and my mom stayed at home. We agreed that it would be too much to say goodbye at the airport - this was a good move. We flew, with Lufthansa, out of OR Tambo at 8.30pm, and it was a bit crazy with the kiddos. They're usually asleep by 7pm, so they were both a little loopier than usual. The flight to Frankfurt was fine, but the tv screens were hazy and slow to respond which was a pain. I was pleasantly surprised at the legroom in the economy class, and we sat four across one of the middle row - my husband and I sandwiching the kids. In the end we gave them some Allergex and they slept a fair portion of the way. Frankfurt is a great airport for long layovers. We arrived at 6.30am and went through a hectic security check, then sat in a restaurant watching the sun rise, and contemplating our journey. When the kids could keep it together no longer we went to pick up some strollers (a free service at the airport) and headed to the showers. For 8 Euros we were able to freshen up in the spacious shower rooms (towels and soaps provided) and put our game faces on for the final leg of our trip. Next we found a spot in one of the many relaxation areas, and took turns pushing the kids to the various play areas around the airport. After a lunch of good beer and sausage, we boarded our flight to Calgary at 2.30pm. Flying for 9.5 hours and landing one hour later is hard, especially with kids. This time the Lufthansa flight was a code share on Canadian Air and the flight staff were the best. The airplane layout was different, so we sat three across next to the window, with my hubby across the aisle. We preferred this arrangement because our son had a window seat which was magic for him. The screens worked perfectly and we were comfortable all the way. Aside from our daughter screaming inconsolably for about three of the hours we were in the air, this flight was also fine. That being said, we're loathe to repeat the journey any time soon. Flying with small kids is pretty intense and we've aged in dog years since we left JHB. The flip side is that when you're trying to contain their tiny chaos, you don't have time to dwell on the massive life change you're undertaking. Our arrival in Calgary was uneventful, and actually a bit of an anticlimax. They processed us quickly, and were super friendly. There was no queue and the whole process took about 40 minutes. My mother-in-law and husband's aunt were there to meet us, so we were welcomed with cuddles and whisked off to our new temporary home in Chestermere. We feel incredibly grateful to land this way, and know that very few folks have the same comforts to step into. Our kids love the snow but are still adjusting to the time difference, so sleep is up and down. Fortunately Calgary is super sunny, which helps our circadian rhythms to recalibrate. The people we've met getting our health cards, SIN, and bank accounts sorted are all pathologically friendly and efficient. Chestermere has a busy community center, and we attended a drop-in kids playdate session this morning. We're feeling excited and overwhelmed. Heartbroken and optimistic. So just life, I guess. Thank you to those lovely forum peeps who have helped us on our way. If you're interested in the finer details of our journey, I've been blogging it here: http://unfoldingodyssey.com/.

This forum contains a list of designated employers under the AIPP - which means they don't need to have an LMIA to offer employment to a foreign worker: https://www.ppforum.ca/articles/changes-to-atlantic-immigration-pilot-applauded-but-more-are-needed/ This could be very helpful to some of you looking for employment from SA! Thanks to Tania who posted this in the "South Africans in Atlantic Canada" FB group

Now about Y2K..... It was about 18 years back that I was manufacturing thingies.... one such thingie was a simple dumb (ie: no intelligence) keypad for access to buildings. I was approached by one of the installation companies in a panic as I needed to prove that the keypad was not a killer time based robot that was going to destroy the building (& take over the world) at the stroke of 12am 2001. I did some paperwork and all was well. Well, the joke was on me.... as predicted, when I woke up on Y2K+1 day, I was immediately attacked by my iRoomba floor cleaning robot, which incidentally had not been invented in Y2K, but had traveled back in time to get me. After killing it by pulling all the wires out and cutting the green one, I staggered bleeding to the kitchen., There, my fridge, tumble drier and washing machine were having a drunken party. As I entered, they immediately attacked and tried to kill me. I escaped within an inch of my life. Running to the garage I jumped into my car which immediately locked me in and reversed out the driveway nearly hitting stuff (which is why to this day Canadians reverse into their drives.) Speeding down the road in my Y2K possessed car, I screamed help - it laughed at me in an evil voice saying DIE HUMAN SCUM DIE, as did all the other people being herded by the Y2K monster. All the robots (traffic signals) were out flashing all different colours in random sequences because their clocks had clock a zero at midnight and now their logic was all loony. Finally, my car sped into a field, the door opened and I was spat out by ejection, asideways ejection seat, which is fortunate as I didn't have a sunroof. I was ejected it seems onto millions of other writhing corpses, which at first I thought was a Y2K orgy, but actually it was the beginning of the walking dead, I say, I say. I'm not sure as my memory is dim, just how I escaped Y2K to this day, but I did and the human race in another place - despite the dire, and accurate warnings by the "Scientists" and the sensational press, no-less. Some less lucky ones had sold up or fled, or drawn all their money out of the bank, because all the worlds banking systems were going to fail. As was the water, and power and sanitation - mind you Y2-18 seems to have come true in SA now. Of course, we now have to survive 2038, that's the new Y2K - you know orange is the new black. And darn-gone-it, I was asleep when the world ended in 2012, you know the dire Mayan Calendar - luckily it seems that the people in the know made a 'miscalculation" and the Mayan end has moved? Or could it be, that the Mayan calendar keeper just got tired after 2012 was added, or perhaps he died of a dreaded disease, or was pillaged by savages? Or perhaps he had a sense of humour and thought, Ha, Ha - lets confuse the future fools.... And then I began to remember back to the OZONE layer, OMG, now was that a story and a half!......

And here I go, run away rant train, read at your peril: I sense another liberal - lover.?! (I meant this a genuine compliment !!!) Should we be taking our shirts off and taking selfies.... or prancing around in traditional Indian attire making a complete fool of an entire Nation, or perhaps lunching with a terrorist? Or no, even better, lets give $10.5 Million to convicted terrorists that kill Americans - and we wonder why the USA is not happy with us? No, I know !!!!! Lets tweet that all persecuted (or those that feel they are) are welcome to come to Canada - so 50 000 people can cross illegally into Quebec. [It's a new thing - PM's tweet before engaging brain.] Or after a whole motor plant local of people lose their jobs and face a bleak Christmas, let's tweet $ 50 Million to Trevor Noah's Nelson Mandela Thing.... I heard Charity begins at home, I know outrageous helping your own people, it won't get you celeb status. Hmm, perhaps lets ensure Canadian industry can't compete with the USA by carbon taxing them, or lets call CO2 pollution - after all, it's such a terrible pollutant that it's only the basis of all life on the planet..... I know, we can't predict weather a week in advance, but we know exactly what's going to happen in 50 years. You know computer models.... Used to be, when I was a "scientist" that you developed a theory and then tested it against the data, if it failed, it was YOUR theory that sucked and was a failure - Now, you develop a model, when the data fails to fit it, the environment is wrong and not your model. Interesting development. Back to the $ 50 Million : Why not help your own people first???..... After all, you are putting illegal border crossing (50 0000) into hotels here with an allowance of $4000/M and a work permit. What's that I hear?? - You have 1000's of highly skilled people waiting for their legal correctly filed Visas..... What's that? You won't change the border status to allow the cops to turn these endangered USA people back? Really? And yet everyone still loves you, worships you, hangs on your every erum, erum, "no we prefer "PEOPLE KIND" - not "Man Kind" - . Perhaps not everyone loves you as much as you might think. The sad part is the people in general don't seem to care much for Selfie Sam Peter Pan, but they'll vote him back in again so the budget can balance its self. (Because as everyone knows, budgets do that all the time - who needs and experienced accountant.) Hmm, perhaps trust-funds balance their budgets, during selfie dances. And of course, lets buy a $ 4.5 billion pipe line that cannot be built because of the Rules you put in place. You know veto rights. Mind you well carbon tax the country and at the same time campaign to have a new oil pipe built. "Canada's boreal forest region covers almost 60% of the country's land area, essentially spanning from the Atlantic to the Pacific" Did anyone ever consider that Canada is likely "Carbon Negative" - the boreal forests, huge lakes and wide open spaces use so much CO2 that we as a country should be paying carbon deficit tax to the world for taking up more than our fair share of Carbon. (You know the price on pollution (CO2) which grows the corn that feeds the people.) Modern farming is producing more planter per SQ foot than ever before - let's lose the CO2. Mans brilliant at interfering with the planet : (Good intentions an all:) Australia: Myxomatosis, grass lengths increased, limiting the environments in which P. argus could live, thereby contributing to the decline of the butterfly population; In October 2018, it was reported that a mutated form of the virus may have jumped to hares. Or In 1930s Queensland, Australia, cane beetles were destroying sugar cane fields with their voracious appetites. Instead of opting for vicious, primitive pesticides, farmers heard of a toad that had a taste for the destructive insects. So in 1935, 102 toads travelled in two suitcases from Puerto Rico to Australia. Instead of doing their job in the cane field, they wandered off and now their number stands at more than 1.5 billion, covering more than 386,000 square miles of Oz. Instead of beating the pests, they became one. Or harlequin ladybird, Cannibal snail, Paper mulberry tree and the list goes on. But perhaps a great one was DDT: The greens were ecstatic at the eradication (and yes, it was a problem.) But….. Robert Gwadz of the US National Institutes of Health said in 2007, "The ban on DDT may have killed 20 million children." (Controversial Figure). My rants are just frustration at a world that runs with limited data and makes sweeping claims - the storms are worse? Really, no, they are similar - to previous cycles - there are more people living in more inappropriate places, hottest days? No, check again. Did you know the entire temperature data for the planet comes from essentially one source? So everything we see and hear on the sensational news is based on one organisations data? That's scientific. The suns recent increased activity has nothing to do with the "Hottest ever" - really, all energy comes from the sun and if it's blasting out great-balls-o-fire, it sure as hell is going to toast us. Good news, the sun is entering a cooling phase. Did you know the real greenhouse gas is water vapour? Yip, not CO2. But there is no money in water vapour. Interestingly, the more water vapour in the air, the more likely clouds are to nucleate and the more suns energy gets reflected. Global warming is "settled science," we hear all the time. Really Newtons laws of physics were a settled science - for close to a century then came Einstein and the modern age of quantum mechanics and Newtons Laws bowed and bent and broke. Science it seems is never settled even after the fat lady has sung. "We haven't seen that rapid acceleration in warming after 2000 that we see in the models," said Myles Allen, professor of geosystem science at Oxford and one of the authors of the study. "We haven't seen that in the observations." (oh, oh - this guy is going to be hung!) And, of course, he's quite right. As we've noted here numerous times, the much-feared "global warming" trend seems to have halted somewhere around 1998. We know this is true because satellite temperature readings — the most accurate temperature gauge since it takes in the entire atmosphere, not just parts of it — show there's been virtually no change. Everyone needs to take a deep breath - especially me (perhaps I need medication!!!) and concentrate on compelled speech, and I as a GLOBULL denier will retire to my corner of shame ! And die in a rabid-hurricane-tornado-ice blast-heat stroke. Y2K any one?

A beginner's guide...excuse any typos. A South African's Guide to Express Entry_ MB.pdf

Dear All Thank you for accepting me on this Forum. I've prayed about this decision and I'm excited and nervous at the same time. Reading through some of the material is quite daunting and somewhat overwhelming. I'm just getting started with the application process. I'm 35yrs old with 2 daughters aged 8 and 6. I'm a qualified pharmacist in South Africa with 10 years experience in the field. I am ready to make the move to Canada. Please can you offer some guidance; where do I start? I'm a single parent; so I need to find out about child care and schools in safe areas. What areas to apply for and since I would like to work and live in Canada; what Visa should I apply for. Look forward to hearing your feedback; and thank you for all assistance Melissa

FINALLY !!!! (Speaking like a real old guy.) It seems Ontario Police & Law makers (In this case the Liberals whom I despise actually did something smart, I know, it was not rampant spending for a change, but they probably created an expensive committee to create a committee to hire people, to get a committee, to work on a paper to submit to a committee, to work it out.). The penalties for Distracted driving (Cell phones) beginning in January 2019 will be as follows: (These are maximums I think, so they may be more lenient if they want to, however, distracted driving covers many things - I doubt considering the continued warnings and cell-carnage that happens daily that the police will be kind or understanding. ) 1st Offence : 3 DAY licence suspension, $1000 & 3 Demerit point - That's close to drunken driving. (i.e. Might add $50 - $100 per month to insurance depending on the company. Some do some don't. But it's very hard to move and get a good deal if your hand is weak! So even if you find a company that does not generally penalise and try to move, they will rub their hands in glee and lump on a whole lot of $$$ for bad driving. ) 2nd Offence : 6 Day suspension, 6 Points $2000 (so now you have 9 OUCH ! Insurance will gouge you big time. Might have to sell the car as $1500 insurance / month's not affordable....) 3rd Offence : 30 day suspension, $3000 , points? - You're pretty much done by this time. (Yeah, get a bicycle. You can't afford insurance anymore. Drive without insurance - BAD IDEA . You're spiraling into hell here.) Drive during a suspension ? Hmmm, not good. I see it every day, as do our drivers - cellphones by the hundred in laps, in hands and on ears - on the 401 @ 100Km/h with 8 lanes whipping back and forth, the busiest highway in N America. I think it's an addiction, not just a habit - it's going to be really hard for people to break . And all you have to do is pick that phone up once and be seen by a cop and you're in a whole lot of trouble - about time !

Worrying about where a good place might be is definitely the way a South African thinks 💃 (For good reason). There, It's a matter of survival, the 'worse' the area, the more likely one is to have a bad ending - 5 mins of YouTube will fill anyone in that is not sure what I mean - just look up "SA Hijack / Carjack" . Canada is an extremely diverse country - it's almost like several countries in one. Even the accents change as you go from East to West. West is best they (the west like to say), or East is Chill they say on the other side, where their dialect is often rather different. West is expensive, and East is affordable - or so I am told. Central is somewhere in-between. Manitoba has farms, Alberta oil. Saskatchewan has both. British Columbia has mountains and natural beauty unlike anything you've likely seen. Ontario is busy, the hub of most industries, Quebec is.... well different and French...., and the Maritimes (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island (PEI)) are ,as above, more affordable, more chilled and friendly and they have Potatoes by the dozen. New Newfoundland (pronounced "new FIN land" - I have no idea why, but DON'T say it wrong!)and Labrador are large in area and somewhat colder (they promote tourism) - the cold Atlantic current flows past with icebergs, and hapless polar bears whom are victims of Globull warming - doomed to drift until their icebergs melt and the oceans rise. (Did I really say "Whom?") Ha!, They should make a movie like Polar-nado-bergi (bergi's like in Capetown, savages of the mountain) with Tara Reid, just think how cool it might be if stranded polar-bears filled with globull-swarming rage poured down on drowning America and ate people for payback. They could then poop carbon neutral pellets to save the world.... Hmm, wonder if Fox News would pick this one up?! I think I'll twit it to them..... If I'm sneaky, it's become an inter-fact and experts will get in on the deal and they will interview wise Greens. There will be funding and parties and jets, and conventions and meetings and cabinets and IPCC's, "D's" and "E's". Just think of all that money !!! Woooohooo ! I can't say I know much about the North West territories, except they pay really well, but are really expensive. My dental hygienist (sound's cool eh?) told me she made close to a million dollars working (no seriously) there for a while - she didn't say how much she had left when she came back, but she told me she burst into tears when she saw the 401 again! It must have been ok, she bought a house (I kid you not) - on her own, perhaps a pharmacist might do well there? Why doesn't everyone go there? Well, it's cold and far - sort of the Canada people in SA visualise. My teeth were never the same again,by the way, she scraped them away. Like all countries, there are good and bad places, which are small spots in a big area. The current government is doing it's best to increase the number of "bad" places, but they have a long way to go before their (gov) ingenious-creations-of-diabolical-stupidity (ICDS) grow to the point where they threaten many people. Now... if we could just cancel the PM's twitter account - it's a "twitter" account, because it seems "twit" comments seem to belt out of it like diarrhea from a bear with a bad stomach, could be a floating, stranded, polar bear with carbon-di-poxide-bs- diarrhea. "Anyways..." (as they say here), with that in mind, you could throw a dart at the map, move where it lands and you'd be about 99.9999% likely to land in very safe area. There may not be anybody there as most of the country is wilderness , but you'd be safe from the people baddies, polar bears - not so much - especially the angry ones. You should re-throw it if it lands in Quebec, unless you speak French. The cops here are great, they really do an excellent job.The emergency services are brilliant - they are where you need them at the drop of a hat. Bad things don't happen to the first responders (well not rape and theft and SA stuff), unless it's the 401 highway, in which case they sometimes get flattened by an inattentive driver - which is about 75% of the 401 drivers at any given time.... You know, Gotta check my "OMG likes" on FB, or get that urgent email out, or chat my BFF.... Or spin a bromance. The cities are highly functional and you generally get good value for your Tax. No chicken coups, or fire pool - well less anyway. However, ah, the "but" - poverty is where the bad stuff generally happens. So, you want to move to a place where work ethic is favoured over Netflix couch ethic. There is social welfare and there are plenty of parasites too. When you arrive, you will very quickly pick up where you should not be. It's really easy - the good places have people zooming about with purpose in their eyes, the bad places have hoodies with jeans about their ankles waddling like dopey-geese, and loitering around graffiti sprayed on things - a bit like dog pee on a fire hydrant, just less thoughtful and bigger. People with meaningful jobs don't seem to waste their time spray painting things, unless, that's their job of course - and interestingly, you can make quite a good living painting - well, houses and stuff, or road markings, not glyphs on someone's wall . Mind you, the road marking guys (sorry, people) seem to be a little drunk when they do the markings as they wander about the road in a kinda Snakey fashion. Or perhaps, seeing as pot is legal, thanks Peter Pan, they are potted up a (climate change) storm, and doing the doobie-woobie-drive while manning (sorry peopling) the painter buggy??? No walking & ropes here - we drive our lines out. Peter Pan Says: "Here in Canada, we prefer to say 'People Kind' " not "Man Kind". Because that's blatantly sexist, and Men are not kind, they are the "Tyrannical Patriarchy". I apoloise for being a men (again). I think I am a men, but I might be fluid too - I just haven't worked it out yet, I am what I think I feel like. Perhaps I might be really fluid in the years to come as the final strokes of nature's malice see me age to tyrannical patriarchal drooling & incontinence . I think I might have anger issues? It's my moms fault. That's Canada for you, Liberal to the teeth (Amazing they have not deported me already), Smug and cold - but a hell of a great place to live and an awesome place to raise PC kids. By PC I don't mean "Particularly Cool".... As a disgusting member of the "Tyrannical Patriarchy" I apologise in arrears (not from my rear...) for my bad ways and snarky fingers. It just happens; and I watch in horror as my carbon-finger-prints write this terrible stuff.....It's all a sign of carbon dioxide price on pollution of my brain, the concentration has gone super critical. I have too much carbon in too little area. Seriously though, I really hope you figure out all the stuff you need - it's very daunting, but as Nelline said - you know the elephant thing, unlike me, she's genuine & kind and offers sooth advice! Sometimes people come on the forum and you feel sad for them as the odds are bad, but as a pharmacist, the odds are good - you go gurl !

Thank you @LidiaS77 that is good advice.

@pandaCat My employment letters also said "To whom it may concern" and was accepted for our EE application without any issues. If you haven't already, you can maybe consider writing the employment reference letter(s) yourself and just getting the relevant person at the company to read and sign it. In this way you can make sure that you provide all the information required e.g. detailed description of your duties so that it correlates with your NOC code.

Hi Melissa, I am going through the process myself with Express Entry (which is the easiest if your CRS points are approx >440). I found this guide very helpful to outline the steps and explain all the acronyms: I would start by calculating your CRS score with: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/skilled/crs-tool.asp Thats just my 2c, I am sure you will get some good advice on this forum. Good luck!

Hi Having gone through this ourselves, in fact my wife is still trying to get this resolved, I would say if you don't need to do it right away, wait 5 years so you don't need the clearance.

Hi, No, sorry. Mainly electrical/mechatronic engineers/technologists, or anyone with experience in automation (control side).

Some relief for those hovering below 440 with the latest draw on 19 Dec at 439 points.

Depends on your field. The company (automation systems) I work for has been hiring non-stop since I started in Feb this year. We have a lot of work lined up. The other day I was asked whether I know anyone in control systems in SA, and they interviewed my recommendation two days later.

Welcome in Canada. We can meet up. Let us know...

A Sun Dog. Calgary daytime.

Nice. Finally something they have done right for a change!😁

Welcome to the forums, @Ulrichm It is both an exciting and frightening moment when you realize and make that decision. It is still early stages but if you can determine your EE score, I think you'd be better to know where you stand and understand the ins and outs of the process. I think your husband may score better being the main applicant. I second @Nelline suggestions for you to check out PNPs and other routes. Best of luck!

Welcome, Marlene! You need to research the PNP routes (provincial nominations). Look at all the Provinces' PNPs, especially the ones which do not require a job offer because to get an offer of employment from a Canadian employer whilst you're still in SA will be very difficult (getting an LMIA is hard work and without that you cannot get a work permit). Do a search on this forum for "PNP" and "Provincial nomination" and you will find a wealth of reading to do. You are unlikely to get an invitation to apply for PR via the Express Entry route with the qualifications you mentioned, your EE scores just won't be high enough, sorry. Also research the AIPP (Atlantic Immigration Pilot Programme) through which designated employers can make you a job offer without requiring an LMIA. Good luck!

Sunset facing from East Van to downtown earlier in the year. This beautiful color was gone by the time I got downtown.

Hi @Liezelleroux i had a consultation with an immigration lawyer and was advised that this route should not be undertaken. She said that it would take too long for me to get to Canada and have my spouse and in my case my child sponsored. also if you try to sponsor your spouse as soon as you get there then CIC might look at this as misrepresantion and you would mention in your application that the spouse is not accompanying. In the opinion of the lawyer, CIC might reject or One would have to put up a strong case to prove otherwise. Please retake IELTS and also look into PNP programmers to better your chances.

Hello iguessee, I submitted my providendt as proof and got my PPR in May and received my passport with corp in June and will be landing in Toronto mid December 2018.

Pray that some industrial engineers have retired by the time you get here. Apparently, there aren't many new positions. This is regarding the job market for engineers in Canada: https://engineerscanada.ca/sites/default/files/Labour-Market-2015-e.pdf It includes useful graphs/charts showing which provinces might have the most opportunities for a particular type of engineer. This might be important in deciding where to settle/look for a job.