Welcome to Canada, Finally

Posted by Cynical Sarah on April 17, 2006

I’ve been waiting to write this column for quite some time now. I’ve been going through the immigration process for a couple years now with a lot of bad luck and serious concerns about the competency of immigration workers. Now that I’ve finally processed through immigration and am officially a permanent resident of Canada, I can let the world know about my experience without too much fear of retribution.

I won’t go through the whole painful process. Just relating my final experience actually immigrating at the airport should be enough to give you an idea what the process was like for me.

To start with, I was in line at customs for something like an hour, so I was pleasantly surprised that immigration wasn’t too busy for those of us officially processing through as immigrants. On the other hand, all those people tagged as potential illegal immigrants had a huge lineup and for once I wasn’t waiting for hours in that line.

Instead, I got my luggage and went into the doors marked “first time immigrants only,” where I was greeted by some sort of receptionist. She was pleasant, checked my paperwork and gave me some useful information booklets and showed me where I needed to sit to wait for another guy to call me forward.

So I sat, and it wasn’t long before the next guy called me forward. He checked out my paperwork again. I guess the photos with my paperwork were good enough for the immigration office in Buffalo but not good enough for this guy. So my money spent on those was wasted as I was given a number and told to sit and wait to get a new photo taken.

I was probably sitting for about 10 minutes before being called in to take my photo. The lady looked at my paperwork (this seems to be a theme with every step of this process) and then made me wear a black cape and pull my hair back so I’d take the most unflattering photo ever. Yay me.

After she’s processed her black and white Polaroid and glued it in the place of the other one on my paperwork, she showed me where I should sit and wait for my number to be called.

So I sat and watched as other people processed through. Like I said, it wasn’t too busy though so after the photos I was only about five numbers away from being called up. During that time I watched the three immigration officers that were helping people and calculated which one I was most likely to get. The crazy things you’ll do when you’re bored, right?

So finally my number, 27, comes up and I go to a nice immigration officer who’s relieved that I speak English. I’d just gotten done watching her using lots of made up sign language to help out the previous guy, so I could understand her relief.

So once again, she looks over my paperwork, just like all the rest, and starts the process of officially entering me as a resident or whatever it is I’m there for. She’s either entering in information on the computer to make sure I get my permanent resident card in six weeks like I’m supposed to, or she’s just typing to make it look like she’s doing something important.

While she’s typing, she’s asking me all sorts of questions. I’m not sure if she’s supposed to ask them, or if she’s just trying to keep things interesting while she types on the computer. These are all questions I’ve been asked many, many times through immigration paperwork and during the immigration appeals process, so who knows what’s really going on.

I’m pretty much becoming a firm believer that none of these different offices and agencies actually talk to each other anyway. None of these immigration officers really know how the process actually works either. It’s all just designed to suck as much money from you as they can until they figure you’ve had enough and let you in.

Case in point, I asked if I could get my permanent resident card in my married name instead of my maiden name. My passport is the only thing still in my maiden name because I didn’t want to send it in to get it changed when I knew I’d need to send it to immigration at some point. There’s no way I was going to delay the immigration process just to change a name.

So anyway, I’m informed that because my passport was still in that name, they assumed that’s the name I preferred and made my paperwork that way. At this point they have to do my permanent resident card in that name too. But then she starts looking up my information in the computer system and it’s all in my married name.

Regardless, my card will come with my maiden name on it and then I’ll have to go pay another $50 at some point to have it changed. You’d think after all the money I’ve poured into their system by this point, they could just save me the trouble just this one time.

Two hours after landing in Vancouver, all I really had to show for all this hassle was another piece of paper in my passport saying I was legal until I get my permanent resident card and enough sweat from nervousness and the heat of being packed in with hundreds of people in customs to fill a bucket. Oh, and a nice “Welcome to Canada” from the immigration officer.

- Sarah L. Polson

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