Sometime in 2017, a colleague and friend of mine was issued Canadian permanent residence also known as PR. With the PR, she had to relocate to Canada. Relocating to a foreign land where she barely knew anyone, she tried to convince me to apply as well so I could join her in the journey to a new land. During that period, Nigerians were barely exploring the Canadian PR route for relocation except for a few. According to her, I fit the profile in terms of age and qualification and would easily get the PR without any issues.
Despite her persistence, I vividly refused. As far as I was concerned, I was not interested in living abroad. At most, I saw abroad as a beautiful place to visit mainly for vacation purposes. I clearly remembered my experience giving birth to my second child in the US, where I had spent about 3 months living with my big sister. By the end of my stay, I was able to convince myself that life abroad was not for me. By the time I was pregnant with my third child, my husband and I planned for the delivery to happen in the US again to secure our child’s citizenship. We had hospital, accommodation and flight ticket arrangements all settled. However I was not looking forward to the trip. As faith would have it, my baby came earlier than expected in Nigeria, so delivery plans in the US had to be canceled.
Back to the PR topic, I did not listen to my friend and ended up not pursuing Canadian PR until 2021. Fast Forward to that time, Nigeria was perceived to be in its worst state since its independence. Insecurity was at a high rate, the economy was very bad, people especially across the middle class were leaving the country in masses. In my office alone, the attrition rate was at the highest. Talents were being lost to countries like Canada and the UK. The massive relocation now had a name to it ‘Japa’ meaning ‘leaving’. At this point, my husband and I were not thinking about our preferences any more but what we thought was best for our 3 kids. Afterall, only 1 of our kids had US citizenship. So we had to secure the future of the remaining two as well. I started the Canadian PR process, however it was not a smooth one. Age was not an advantage anymore, COVID had caused serious delays with educational verification required, there were months of backlogs with the PR processing and a lot of people had caught up on the Japa fever. At some point, the express entry PR process which I was to apply for was paused by the Canadian authorities for almost a year.
I eventually completed a PR profile and entered the express entry pool in September 2021 with an above average point, waiting for the regular draws. Since then I have had to resubmit my profile a second time because of its 1 year validity. Every 1 March being my birthday, my score reduces by 5 points. I also have to rewrite the English exams for PR every 2 years with my most recent attempt being in January 2023. As at today, I am yet to be called up for PR but I am optimistic that what will be will be. I am also occupying my thoughts and time through learning a second language, French. Afterall, I could earn an extra 50 PR points if I write and pass the required exams. This would put me among the top scoring candidates for PR.
To be continued…
#EMBA28 #Babyblogger
