At some point in October 2016, I decided that I needed a change, in November 2016, I decided that that change would not be a new job, a new relationship, a new position but rather a change of environment, my home country which I left 7 years ago was not an option. I don’t care for corruption, rampant lawlessness and discrimination. I do however love my family and miss them dearly. But I am not a tadpole anymore.
In December 2016, my mind was set, I would move to Canada, and start over. I would leave my family behind, my new adopted country, my 3 friends, and I would move 6000 miles to Vancouver Canada.
I went on the IRCC site and looked at the requirements… As someone whose intention was to immigrate as a Skilled Worker, I would need to fulfill some key Requirements
- Language Ability in French, English or Both. .. my dad says my first sentence was ‘no onions’ I was not concerned about this. I took the IELTS. The minimum accepted by IRCC is 6 avg, with no less than 6 (out of 9) in either Reading, Writing, Listening and Speaking. In 2010 when I last took this test, I had an avg of 8. I hoped this would not be an issue.
- Police Clearance from any country I had resided in for more than 6 months since age 18. For me that was 3 countries.
- Education Equivalence – ECA Education Credentials Assessment for any academic qualifications above high school received outside Canada. The higher the degree, the better the ranking. I have an MA from the UK
- Medical Clearance. Canada is famous for the their health care system. You can’t fault the country for not allowing people with communicable diseases in. I took the test.
- Age – this was an interesting one. The sweet spot is 18-35, 12 points, any younger you do not get a point, any older, you lose a point for each year.
So in December I started the process.
Things I didn’t Expect / Mistakes 1/2
I will focus on the main one for now, more will be in a later post
Not Doing everything at once.
First I signed up for the next English test – it only happens once a month, the next one was scheduled for January 20th. So I registered for that and waited. After taking the test, I then requested for my Education Assessment – from requesting my university for the documents to submitting them to WES to a complete evaluation this would take almost 3months to be completed and then my Police Clearance from the UK- Even with the option of expedited processing, the physical documents had to be mailed. Another month. Finding an appointment with the only certified doctor the could do the test- another 2 weeks.
If I had to do it over again, I would request everything at once so all processes were running alongside each other.
In the end, it took 3 months before I was able to submit my application, once submitted, I entered the Express Entry Pool and waited for my ITA. I had over 450 points. In the very next selection, I got the ITA.
Waited some more for the missing documents and on June 21, I was finally able to submit. The cost at that time to me was
- $200 – Medical exam at IOM
- £ 45 + £80 – UK Police clearance expedited and shipping
- $350 Trip for birth country Police Clearance
- $100 Birth country Police clearance – expedited
- $950 – Canada Application and Right of PR Fee
- ++Added later the items below
- $1250 – KLM ticket Entebbe to Halifax via Amsterdam, Toronto.
- around $100 for sending passport to Tanzania for processing.
So on June 21, I received my AOR – When you receive this, you are told the standard processing time is 6 months.
The waiting had officially began.
Alien in Canada 