Welcomed with folded arms

I was very young, but recall well the emotion felt, especially by my mother, when entering Canada back in 1970. Many questions at customs, many nerves frayed. Neither side spoke the language of the other, but we got through. Things didn´t come easy, we went from having our own apartment in Lisbon, to renting a top floor bedroom and kitchen, (with a shared bathroom), on Shaw St. The jobs available weren’t the best, but it kept the family housed, clothed and fed. It wasn’t long before our housing situation improved, and life took its normal course from then on. Just like us, there were thousands of others, striving for the same thing, some already well established. We were all neighbours, then friends. Life was good for everyone, we found stability, and for those who faced desperate times ‘back home’, the sun was beginning to shine. Parents had to work as hard as they ever did, but they could see a bright future, that was their incentive.

We all know that today that kind of scenario is inconceivable. Families come, but they can’t afford to rent that one bedroom with the kitchen and the shared bathroom. The money they might make won’t cover living expenses. The city is only for investors and speculators. In order to live there you have to have cash and stability, because now, renting a place to live requires the same documentation as when you ask your bank for a loan, thus, people who have just arrived have very little chance at attaining proper housing without some sort of government or NGO assistance. So, because newcomers are no longer able, for the most part, to get themselves going on their own, the process of settling in becomes much more complicated and slower. Many residents now see these people as a nuisance and a burden, instead of what these people are really trying to be, which is a team player, what the country needs more of and cannot live without.

There are several reasons for this, and Canadians know what they are much better than I. But, if I may, I’d like to point a couple of them out. One major one is complacency. Many of us forget what it was like to start anew. Of course, most of us alive today were too young then to really feel the pain and worry felt by our elders, but even some of them seem to set aside those memories and opt for the ‘not in my backyard’, or ‘not with my money’ attitude. There are some good reasons for taking such a stand, but many people that continue make the attempt at a better life for themselves are trying to leave situations that were far worse than ours ever were. Nonetheless, the country is not at all prepared to take in the people they desperately need because everything is so damn expensive, which means even those who live and work legally are having a seriously hard time making ends meet. In turn, they wonder how taking in immigrants, refugees and foreign students will be possible without making their own struggle even more difficult. That’s a valid point, but what are the options? Canadian businesses need these workers, which traditionally, (just like the Portuguese, and others did), do the work that most Canadians won’t. Universities claim that their income will suffer with lower numbers of foreign students, and finally, Canada has a legal and moral duty to help those fleeing all kinds of dire situations in their own homelands. But everything is so damn expensive! That’s the real issue here. The monster that is the originator of all of humanity’s current woes. And nothing will be done about that, so in order to appease the general population, politicians create legislation to try and soften the blow. In this case, they are gradually restricting the numbers coming in by setting caps across the board. I don’t believe it’s much of a solution, but certainly it will make some happy, while others not, as per usual. It certainly won’t improve the process for those in need. Honestly, I don’t think there is any chance of a solution, other than going back to the days where everyone had a fair chance. For some reason, that’s gone.
Fiquem bem,

Raul Freitas/MS