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Making the Canadian dream come true |
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By Cheryl Antao-Xavier » Success – not always an easy trip – can be a bumpier ride for an immigrant starting afresh in Canada.
Apart from the obvious challenges, such as having to adjust to life in a new country, there are numerous other obstacles that have to be overcome. But stay the course, and there’s no telling how far you can go.
 Saldanha... integration is important
When he moved to Canada, from Karachi, Pakistan, he discovered his medical qualifications counted for very little. There was a complete absence of a support system, and foreign professionals had to pay exorbitant fees to write an exam. With jobs hard to come by and no income, he had to depend on relatives and friends.
“Coming from a status of a professional to being dependent in every sense of the word was an eroding of self-respect,” says Saldanha. “Just having to pay the TTC fare was a challenge.”
That was 25 years ago, but Saldanha, who now shares his learning experience through mentorship programs, says even today, not enough is done to help integrate immigrants into society and the workforce.
He sees first-hand the health consequences of the failure of integration. “My patients are mostly immigrants, and I frequently see high stress levels and depression resulting from adaptation problems.”
Saldanha, who has served on numerous committees on immigrant integration and business promotion, says the public and corporate sectors need to move on from ‘lip service’ to “practical, definitive solutions in addressing newcomers’ integration into society and the workforce.”
On the other side of the issue, he emphasizes the need for immigrants to “create that passion to serve and participate in the socio-political process of this great country that has accepted them and given them a future.”
 Laluque in her studio, and (inset) the magazine she was featured in
Coming to Canada meant being discovered anew. “We knew no one when we came here,” says Laluque. “We had to re-build our lives and social network.”
Husband Mykola, a magazine editor in the Ukraine, couldn’t find a job in his line and worked in a fast food restaurant. Not being able to communicate in English didn’t help (it would take the couple three years to learn the language).
Fortunately for Laluque, art is a language in itself, and 10 days after she arrived in Canada, she got work in a potter’s studio working the kilns. “Artists generally want to help other struggling artists to find work,” she said. “I walked in from the street with my portfolio and she (potter) gave me work and a corner of her basement to set up my own art work.”
That was the start she needed, and eight years later, a short distance from where she originally set up home, the Laluque Atelier Gallery of Toronto is a testimony to her perseverance to stay the course. Her husband has taken over the administration and sales management of the gallery, freeing her to concentrate on her art.
Laluque, who last year received a grant from the Ontario Arts Council for a ‘Canadiana project’, advises immigrant artists not to get discouraged. “Don’t get sidetracked into other professions, or abandon your art,” she says.
 Yin... confidence in her own style
“I almost gave up. Language was a limitation,” admits Yin.
“I have learned to keep writing when the right English word doesn’t come, holding on to the thought and image. Then I go back and find the correct words in the dictionary.”
She recalls how a university professor once read her work and said: “You have a long way to go.”
Yin was undeterred, she had great confidence in the style that worked for her.
Her perseverance paid off and her unique, haunting style caught the imagination and attention of Canadian readers. She received the prestigious Ted Plantos Memorial Award for Poetry in 2005, and her poems and translations are course material at an Ontario college.
Yin has since published three poetry booklets in English and Chinese. She is Director of the Canadian Chinese Poets Association, the Chinese Literature Society of North America and is editor of a Chinese-English literary journal.
To those with English as a second language, Yin’s advice is to “find your own voice and have confidence in it. I can’t write like a Westerner, so I don’t even try to copy one, but feel and write from my own flow.”
There are people who see a poem as a pearl, while others just see the dust on it, says Yin. “So some people just see the grammatical errors and the different word usage. Others see beyond to the pearl.”
A tough business. For immigrants who overcome the early hardships and are looking to take it to the next level of success, there is a different set of challenges.
 Menezes ... entrepreneurial dream
Menezes, president and CEO of Cyberklix Inc, a company he founded to package managed security systems, said the bar is set higher for those who come from outside the country.
He had to overcome the initial scepticism of his ‘foreign’ qualifications. That done, “I had to go the extra mile to prove my credentials.”
Menezes, originally from India, said understanding how the Canadian system works and a knowledge of what is happening in that industry is key to making it big.
“When I started the business in 2000, it was like starting again,” he said. “I maxed out all my credit cards because it was difficult to impossible to get funding. It is a scary feeling knowing you had a mortgage and other bills to pay and not knowing how the business would continue.”
Customers sometimes would not pay bills on time which only added to the financial pressures.
“We finally got help from the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) with a small business loan,” says Menezes.
As a new company, it takes time “to build credibility to compete with the large, established companies in Canada.”
To earn the trust of customers and establish the company as a leader in Information Security,
Menezes formed alliances with big names in IT, Cisco Systems and Network Intelligence.
Today, his retail clients include Sears, Sobey’s and Shoppers Drug Mart.
Menezes advises would-be entrepreneurs to forget about starting up a business as soon as they land in Canada, but instead first take up a job. “Learn how the Canadian system works. Take a job in the field so you can enjoy the learning experience.”
It’s all about building up contacts with decision makers “to make the transition to your own business a lot easier and smoother.”
 Rai with her pink Cadillac
“The first 10 months were hard work,” says Rai, speaking of the time she added regular Mary Kay business training sessions to a fulltime job and caring for home and family.
“I prioritized differently and cut down drastically on socializing outside of the business.”
Rai says the hard work paid off. She tasted success, and vaulted up the corporate ladder, becoming a director in 2000.
Mary Kay consultants typically take a decade or more to hit the $114,000 half-yearly revenues required to earn the coveted pink Cadillac. Rai won the ‘trophy on wheels’ in just her third year – a North American record and a Canadian first. This month, she picked up her fourth pink Cadillac, hitting the required sales target consistently in every consecutive two-year period.
“My culture was never an issue in this company,” says Rai, a Sikh, who proudly wears bejewelled saris to glitzy Mary Kay award ceremonies. Even so, when she was featured in the company’s magazine in 2001, she received emails from East Indian women across North America telling her how her story had inspired them. Her inclusion in a predominantly Caucasian winners’ line-up has done much to promote the company among visible-minority women.
Rai now pushes her sizeable team of consultants to achieve their own dreams. “I never saw myself as a motivator or speaker. It just came from preaching what I practise. I believe in what I do.”
 Lloren... fresh start
Lloren’s advice to new immigrants with impressive job titles on their résumés is blunt: “Forget who you were back home and start life all over again here,” he says, recalling his own less than auspicious start in the Canadian workplace.
“To get the so-called ‘Canadian experience’, I took a job as packer and labeller for a printing press.” For the former senior manager at GSK, a global pharmaceutical giant, and entrepreneur of two businesses, this was “quite degrading.”
After several failed attempts to enter the pharmaceutical industry, Lloren “took a leap of faith” and joined Clarica/Sunlife, selling insurance in a 100% commission-based job.
“I took it against the advice of well-wishers. But I had a wife and six kids to support.”
He worked very hard and “always looked to the client’s financial health, rather than my own need for a commission,” he says.
Within a couple of months, the referrals came pouring in from satisfied clients. The company rewarded him with a trip to Cancun, Mexico and the Bahamas. When he came back they offered him a management position in the biggest sales producing branch at the time.
“But I politely declined so as to follow a collective (with two other colleagues) dream to set up a full service brokerage firm covering insurance, investments and personal banking.”
His company, Crossroads Insurance & Investments, is the result of a right turn on his own crossroad in life.
Lloren’s advice to entrepreneurs is: “Dream. And dream big. It’s free anyway. Stay clear of dream-stealers who don’t believe in you or your dreams. Align yourself with positive people.”
Working for change. Many politicians agree that more needs to be done to help immigrants find their feet so they can go on to truly contribute to Canada.
Two who however speak from experience are Omar Alghabra, Member of Parliament for Mississauga-Erindale, and Jean Augustine, former MP for the Etobicoke-Lakeshore riding.
 Augustine... call for action
“I am living proof that we live in an open and inclusive society,” says Augustine. “But as long as people express that they have experienced racism and discrimination, we still have work to do. We must continue to act.”
Last year, the Ontario government nominated her as Fairness Commissioner, a newly-created position intended to ensure that foreign-qualified professionals can be certified and licensed in the province and that regulatory bodies register them in a fair, and transparent process.
Augustine has an impressive legacy of firsts for visible minorities but perhaps her greatest role yet has been played behind the political scenes as mentor to aspirants to a political career.
“I have learned so much from just watching her conduct herself in politics,” says Patrick Mendes, a candidate she endorsed in recent municipal elections in Mississauga. “Most importantly she has proven that the doors of political office are open to all Canadians.”
 Alghabra... mentoring immigrants
“According to The Economist, Canada is losing approximately $6 billion in economic activity by under-utilizing the skills of its immigrant population,” says Alghabra. “Their integration in the workforce is not just a ‘feel good’ duty, but an economic necessity for this country.”
Alghabra, a Saudi-born Muslim says that some of the challenges to integration are systemic. “You must find a way to navigate through them.”
His own defining moment came when he was sitting around with friends and the discussion turned negative about the political status quo for minorities.
“I went home thinking that talk is useless unless you back it up with action. You have to do something to bring about change. And you can’t expect others to do it if you are not willing to get involved yourself.” |
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