With the recent uproar of Arizona’s new “carry your papers everywhere you go” law to counter illegal immigration, I began to wonder about Canada’s immigration system. How does someone immigrate to Canada anyway? Besides the rite of passage of sticking your tongue onto a frozen pole and an undying love of hockey, what does it take to become a Canadian? I set on a mission to find out.
My first stop is, of course, the official Canadian Immigration website. I immediately noticed two things: one is that there is an abundance of information available on the subject from a very organized Canadian system, and two is the flash selection system the website employs which makes it impossible to access any of the aforementioned information.
After some wrestling with the selection system, I finally found some good information – who you need to be to qualify. There are essentially 4 categories, be rich, be skilled, be a family member, or be here for a while. If you’re rich and want to pour all your money into the Canadian economy, of course we want you! Somebody needs to stimulate the economy besides beer sales. If you’re a skilled professional, like we are all aiming towards, then Canada would love to have your skills and expertise. If you have family members here and you wish to join them, we’re nice enough people to let you come over. Finally, if you’re reading this article, chances are you’re in Canada already. You can use your experience here to land yourself a pass to Canada branded health care.
All the above sounds so organized and civilized. The fence climbing and border control images conjured up from the US-Mexico border don’t really fit here. What fits is hours and hours of paperwork and weeks of waiting for news. Which is worse? I honestly don’t know.
So, by being rich, skilled, or well-connected, you managed to get yourself a visa and decided to come live in Canada. You liked nice people, the snowy weather, and the bilingual cereal boxes enough to want to become a citizen. What should you do now? Well, you’re older than 18 and have lived in Canada for at least 3 years, now you just need to be able to speak English or French, have no criminal history, and know Canadian geography, political system, and history. Oh yeah, you also need to submit an application (we all knew this was coming) and if you’re lucky enough, appear before a judge for a 15-30 minute interview.
By the way, by “know Canadian geography, political system, and history”, they mean you have to take a test on it. Most of the information asked has been taught to us in high school at some point, but some of them can be tricky. For example, what are the rights of a Canadian citizen? How about which province is the only officially bilingual province? (Editor’s Note: It’s not Quebec) Can you name all the federal political parties in the House of Commons and their leaders? If you can, then congratulations; chances are you just passed the immigration test. Now all you’re left to do is attend a ceremony, swear an oath to Her Majesty the Queen, and sing the national anthem.
You are now a Canadian citizen, enjoying all the perks of being Canadian such as public health care, nice people, more progressive laws, a holiday named after a deceased queen of another nation, and most importantly – not being American.
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