Friends,

In the last 10 months or so I have come to closely know many desi friends who have sussessfully transitioned to Canadian mainstream despite the age and mid career hurdles.

I am relating a case here which inspired me a lot. This is an aquaintance who happens to be from bihar as well.

Here is their profile :
Family of 4 , ages at the time of migration 42 , 40, 10,5. ( migrated in 1994)
Profession : Technical sales in india , ( worked in ME for a few yrs after that)
Education : B.Sc ( himself) , Wife : housewife , education 10+2

They migrated 10 yrs back , came with complete family and got a basement apartment on rent of an aquaintance. they say it used to be very intimidating for them in the beginning.

At that time there was no internet for common people , so all job searches used to be by visits to various consultants , offices ...essentially beating the pavement and phone calls was the only way even in winters and snow.

He got his first break after 6 months in sales on commission basis to start with , the employers were skeptical in the beginning ...his wife joined a local super market at $7/hr for helping on the shop , and they got the kids enrolled in the schools local to their basement apartment.
This helped hem to come out of the basement and get a proper apartment, their income was enough to sustain the whole family and still with good finanical discipline make some savings .....in 3/4 years they had saved enough for a small downpayment for a house.....they bought their first house in 1998.

Today , at 52 ,he is the sales manager with that same firm he joined on a parttime comission basis , his wife still works for a supermarket....when they bought thier house she joined the supermarket close to their new place as that was the only job she had learnt after coming here...and in 5 years of working she is now working in store administration/management , and earns over $45k. I asked her how she could do so well ...she said that from the very beginning she worked with much greater sincerety than her local counterparts.....she faced a lot of flak from some local coworkers , but the management recognized it and slowly over the years they kept promoting her. Pretty good deal for a person with only 10+2 education.

Like most indian families are, they had all their focus on their kids and their education ...the eldest is now in univ with partial tuition waiver and the youngest is an honor roll student in school ....and whenever i meet them the kids are full of indian values yet still very canadianized in all the good ways ....they are big maple leaf fans .
I felt touched by their whole experience and i am sharing it here ...i m sure there are many many more and we should keep posting here ...one thing which struck me in them was ,they never seem discouraged or dismayed , despite all the problems they may be facing . Keeping the hopes alive may sound simple , but is a very big thing for those passing thru it.

This is just one of the cases i cameto know , there are so many more such cases of desis coming here and riding out the tough times to see better days. Recently in an indian gathering , i was struck and felt proud by what i saw in the parking lot ....there were so many Suvs, minivans, few BMWs and other high end cars .... it all just told me that there are a lot many well to do indians out there but unfortunately not many come out to tell their story.

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What can be imagined, can be achieved.