Canada: From dreams to nightmares
Friends
Here is another article on the issue I came across.

New Delhi, June 11: Far from being the El Dorado of repute, for many immigrants Canada has emerged as a land of unmitigated disaster. From rampant discrimination to hidden booby traps, Indians have been forced into an economic quagmire that has generated despair and dejection.

Wretched tales abound of even highly qualified Indians landing up in Canada, only to find that they don't get the job that their college degrees and experience require, having to instead settle for a dead-end job, even to the extent of being a sweeper with a PhD!

Unfortunately, for those who actually manage to land the job they want, are sometimes paid 80% or even 70% of the amount a white Canadian will be paid for the same work. This is increasingly happening in recent years, signalling that Indians and the rest of Asians are deliberately discriminated against.

While many say that previously most white Canadians were not really highly educated and that is why immigrants from Asia in the 60s, 70s, and 80s were able to bag jobs that were highly lucrative and satisfying, turning Canada into the proverbial land of milk and honey for themselves.

No longer. The International Herald Tribune's Clifford Crauss tells the tale of Gian Sangha who was so desperate for a job that he willingly cut his hair and removed his turban to canvass for employment, even though he was a Sikh.

An environmental scientist, Sangha even had a doctorate from Germany and had taught in US. "Here in Canada, there is a hidden discrimination," Sangha said. He says Canadian institutions have refused to give him jobs sometimes providing excuses that he is over-qualified for the job!

He is suing them for discrimination. To scrape by, he once cut lawns. Now he does clerical work and shares his house with his extended family. It was not supposed to be this way in Canada, which years ago put out a welcome mat to professionals from around the developing world. With a declining birth rate, an aging population and labor shortages in many areas, Canada, a sparsely populated nation, has for decades opened its doors to engineers, health professionals, software designers and electricians.

But the results of this policy have been mixed, for Canada and for the immigrants. Recent census data and academic studies indicate that the incomes and employment prospects for immigrants are deteriorating. Specialists say a growing number of immigrants have returned to their homelands or migrated to the United States. About 25 percent of recent immigrants with university degrees are working at jobs that require only high school diplomas or less, government data show.

However, writes Crauss, the Canadian public continues to support the government's goal of increasing immigration, and relations among ethnic groups are good, though neighbourhoods in some cities are becoming more segregated. But some fear that if opportunities for immigrants do not expand, social cohesion may suffer. "The existing system is broken," said Jeffrey Reitz, a sociologist who studies immigration at the University of Toronto. "The deteriorating employment situation might mean that Canada will not be able to continue this expansionist immigration program in the positive, politically supported environment that we've seen in the past."

Reitz estimates that foreign-educated immigrants earn a total of $2 billion less than an equivalent number of native-born Canadians with comparable skills because they work in jobs below their training levels.

What immigrants may also be up against is a system that refuses to recognise many of the degrees earned by these people back home. It creates the kind of piquant situation where Canada advertises for doctors and nurses abroad, yet refuses to give Indian medics a job in a hospital, because their degrees are not valid here. Thousands are left jobless.

But there is a light at the end of the tunnel, but not for immigrants. Crauss says, the children of immigrants, who enter the job market with Canadian credentials, typically do better at acquiring high-paying jobs. "We have an arcane infrastructure of professional organizations that essentially mitigate against the immediate integration of these highly skilled immigrants," Joe Volpe, the minister of citizenship and immigration

Volpe said he was concerned that news from disappointed job seekers would seep back to their native countries and discourage qualified people from immigrating.

For Sangha it may have become what he says is "a painful life. I'm angry and frustrated. I never thought it would be like this in Canada."

Immigrants find themselves going cold, wet and hungry in a land they had sacrificed everything they owned to reach. Believing they would be treated well, that their willingness to work long and hard even in inhospitable conditions of Canada would bring them wealth, that jobs would be aplenty, these people are now in a situation that is threatening their health and life because of the longstanding nature of their woes.

They can't even go back to India. Some feel ashamed to go back penniless to their families. It would mean that they were not smart enough to do well as the going principle is that, 'In vilayet even monkeys become millionaires'. Others simply can't put together enough money to pay for their ticket.

This trend has increasingly translated into numerous Indian families moving into so-called slum areas of Canadian cities as they increasingly get impoverished.

For these people ebullience has turned into depression and their chance for plenty has transformed into poverty. Many of them have been left scrounging on Canada's unemployment benefits even having to rely on unemployment insurance and welfare, which is anathema to an Indian.

The only thing in all this misery that is making them continue to hold body and soul together are their children. They are expected to do better and achieve the dreams that have been denied to their parents.

Hope, and scant else, is all that these Indians have been left with after travelling tens of thousands of kilometres to a foreign land. They must be ruing the day they decided to get their passport and jet out of India.

The truth about immigration to Canada
Thousands of eager immigrants arrive in Canada only to discover their education and professional credentials are almost worthless.

The situation is so bad that this week an Edmonton couple decided to sue the federal government.




It is a great irony to many in the immigration field, and to newcomers themselves, a bitter joke. Canada has a shortage of skilled professionals, and yet thousands of internationally trained doctors, engineers, teachers and nurses are forced to deliver pizzas and drive taxis.

Some immigrants believe that this is intentional, that Canada wants them only for their genetic potential. They may sweep floors and clean offices, but their offspring will be intelligent and creative. Why else would the government accept them and then make it so very difficult to have their credentials recognized?

Citizenship and Immigration Canada bristles at such a suggestion, and advises immigrants to check the ministry's Website, which clearly warns newcomers there is no guarantee they will find work in their chosen profession.

Still, frustration is mounting: This week, a British-trained accountant and his bookkeeper wife launched a lawsuit against the federal government, alleging that they were misled by immigration officials who assured them they would find good jobs here. Instead, the couple -- he is originally from Sri Lanka and she from Malaysia -- have spent five years in Edmonton shovelling snow, cleaning toilets and borrowing money to support their teenaged son.

"What angers me is we are capable people. We have the credentials. We just can't get the jobs," complained Selladurai Premakumaran, who feels the government has shattered his hopes and dreams.

Last year, when Canada changed the way it selects immigrants, many were happy to see the end of the old system, which matched newcomers with worker shortages.

Critics had long complained that, by the time the physiotherapists and teachers arrived, those jobs had been filled and the labour shortages were in other fields.

Now, Canada chooses immigrants based not on their occupation, but on their education, skills and language abilities. Applicants must score 67 of a possible 100 points to be accepted. Ostensibly, being talented and smart should make them more employable.

But it isn't working out that way. Canada is recruiting the right kind of people, but they are stuck in a bottleneck, as the agencies and bodies that regulate the fields of medicine, engineering, teaching and nursing struggle to assess their qualifications.

"We have a disaster on our hands," says Joan Atlin, executive director of the Association of International Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario.

"There are thousands of un- and under-employed foreign professionals across the country. At the same time, we have a shortage of skilled professionals, especially in the health-care field. We don't so much have a doctor shortage as an assessment and licensing bottleneck."

About 1,300 doctors from more than 80 countries have joined the association she heads, but she estimates there are many more out there. Ontario alone may have as many as 4,000, most of them still trying to get their medical licences.

At the same time, there is a shortage of as many as 3,000 physicians across the country, especially in smaller communities in Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Ontario (provinces that have been forced to recruit doctors from South Africa, whose medical training Canada considers acceptable).

A recent Statistics Canada study of 164,200 immigrants who arrived in 2000 and 2001 found that 70 per cent had problems entering the labour force. Six in every 10 were forced to take jobs other than those they were trained to do. The two most common occupational groups for men were science (natural and applied) and management, but most wound up working in sales and service or processing and manufacturing.

As well as credentials, there is a problem with supply and demand.

Patrick Coady, with the British Columbia Internationally Trained Professionals Network, believes that far too many engineers are coming -- as many as 60 per cent of all those accepted each year. (In Ontario, from 1997 to 2001, nearly 40,000 immigrants listed engineering as their occupation.)

"When they arrive, the Engineering Council for Canada evaluates their credentials, which sets up the engineer to think there are opportunities here," Mr. Coady says. "Then they discover that each province has a body that regulates the industry. They need up to 18 months of Canadian work experience before they will get professional engineering status. And, there isn't a great need for consulting engineers. A lot of the infrastructure has already been built in this country."

Michael Wu, a geotechnical engineer from China, is a classic example of what's happening. Accepted as a landed immigrant last spring, he came here with his wife and child, leaving behind a relatively prosperous life in Beijing, and now works for $7 an hour in a Vancouver chocolate factory.

Back in Beijing, "I had a three-bedroom apartment and took taxis everywhere -- the Chinese government sent me to build a stadium in St. Lucia," says Mr. Wu, who has a PhD. "Here, no-one will hire me. Many engineering companies think engineers make false documents. They are suspicious of my qualifications. I never imagined I'd end up working in a factory. But I will keep trying. Every month I go to the Vancouver Geotechnical Society lecture."

Susan Scarlett of the Immigration Department points out that regulating the professions is a provincial, not federal, responsibility. "We advise people who are thinking of coming to Canada to prepare by really researching how their credentials will be assessed."

Ms. Atlin says that "Canada has been very slow to change. Our regulatory systems have not caught up with our immigration policies."

But some relief may be on the horizon because the issue has become such a political flashpoint.

A national task force is about to report to the deputy minister of health on the licensing of international medical graduates. And this month Denis Coderre, the federal Immigration Minister, announced that he wants to streamline the process of recognizing foreign credentials, and have provinces announce their inventory of needs so Ottawa can work to fill the shortages.

A doctor 'ready to go anywhere, rural Saskatchewan, small-town Ontario . . .'

Tina Ureten, a diminutive, well-dressed physician from Turkey, was always the hardest-working child in a family of hard workers.

She knew from an early age what she wanted to be, and left home to study science, math and biology at an elite boarding school in Ankara, the Turkish capital. As a scholarship student, she endured ridicule from her friends when she chose to spend summer after summer honing her language skills at a special English-language camp. She aced her university entrance exams, and was one of 20,000 candidates in a field of 400,000 to be accepted by the nation's medical schools. By 30, she had been appointed associate professor of nuclear medicine, a hi-tech field that uses radioactive materials for diagnosis.

Had she stayed in Turkey, she would be at the top of her profession today, a full professor in a department. Instead, she met a Turkish engineer at an international conference, and ended up immigrating with him to Toronto.

Dr. Ureten, now 42, knew it would be difficult to get her medical licence here. But she didn't know it would be such a bureaucratic, disheartening and ultimately fruitless journey.

"I sent my application to the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons 2½ years ago, and I haven't even received a response. I worry my file is lost in a drawer somewhere," she says. "I called my MP and she called the college, and said they were driving her crazy too.

"I am ready to go anywhere, rural Saskatchewan, small-town Ontario. The irony is, almost every province has a shortage in nuclear medicine. This country needs my skills."

When she came here, Dr. Ureten knew she'd have to write exams and was prepared to retrain. She and her husband sponsored their in-laws to come and look after their two young children so she could spend her days in the library studying.

It took her two years to write three of the Medical Council of Canada's evaluation exams, because there is a six-month gap between exams (not the case in the United States).

She passed all three tests but wasn't accepted in the medical residency program. More than 150 people applied for one position in nuclear medicine, and the odds are stacked against foreign-trained doctors. (In Ontario, foreign-trained doctors cannot even compete directly for residency positions open to graduating medical students, but are restricted to a few specialties in short supply.) There is a separate stream for foreign-trained doctors, but it has only 125 spaces for graduates in specific fields -- and nuclear medicine is not one of them.

Dr. Ureten fingers an inch-thick binder, which contains all of her credentials, carefully translated and annotated. There are her fellowships at the University of Wisconsin and in Basel, Switzerland; her training course with the International Atomic Energy Agency, and dozens of peer-reviewed articles published in international science journals.

She sent them all off to the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons in May, 2001. In the past, the college approved the credentials only of doctors who trained in Australia, New Zealand, the United States and England, but two years ago announced a program encouraging all foreign-trained physicians to send in their documents.

Since then, the college has received 600 applications from more than 140 countries, and approved 60 international medical graduates to take Canadian exams in their specialties, says its director of education, Dr.Nadia Mikhael. Dr. Ureten's case is considered "inconclusive," she says. "This case has taken a long time because we are still waiting for Turkey to provide evidence so that we can judge the accreditation system of their postgraduate medical education system.

"We don't want to compromise our Canadian standards. And we have to make other specialties a priority, like gynecology, anesthesiology and obstetrics."

Joan Atlin, executive director of the Association of International Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, says it is misleading for the college even to invite international physicians to send in their résumés because it is impossible to assess the programs of hundreds of medical schools around the world.

She believes a better solution is to assess people on the job. Ontario recently launched a clearing-house program that would do just this: assess fully trained foreign graduates during six-month rotations in hospitals.

"This is the right approach, but it is really just a drop in the bucket."

And it won't help Dr. Ureten because nuclear medicine, once again, is not one of the five specialties in the fast-track program.

"I feel like they are making it impossible. There are some authorities who just don't want foreign doctors in the system," she complains. "I am ready to go anywhere. There is a need in Canada for people like me, trained, ready to go."

Between cramming for medical exams, she found time to train as an ultrasound technician and a medical and cardiac sonographer. Recently, she opened UC Baby in Mississauga, one of the first clinics in Canada to offer pregnant couples a three-dimensional ultrasound and real-time movies of their unborn babies.

"I'm proud of my clinic," she says, "but I still feel I'm overqualified for this."

She yearns for her true love. "I have met many smart, skilled people from many countries, and you know what? Many are leaving for the U.S., where doctors can more easily be integrated into the system."-- Marina Jimenez

A need to nurse

Milica Cerovsek, 46, was a nurse in a military hospital in Sarajevo for more than 17 years: She tended soldiers in the intensive-care unit, assisted with colonoscopies and tended to all manner of emergencies in the surgical unit.

She loved her job so much she sometimes volunteered to work double shifts, forfeiting a night's sleep to nurse patients around the clock, much to her husband's chagrin.

In 1992, conflict in the region spread to open war, people split on ethnic lines, and soon the city was under attack. Although an ethnic Serb, Ms. Cerovsek didn't want to fight; she wanted safety for her two young children. Using her daughter's illness as a pretext, she fled to Belgrade to see a skin specialist, knowing she would never return.

Two years later, she arrived in Calgary as a political refugee, and was soon joined by her husband, a professor of aeronautical engineering. As well as their homeland, they had lost their family, culture and status as respected professionals.

Ms. Cerovsek agreed to put her career on hold while her husband, reduced to delivering pizzas for $7 an hour, went back to school to retrain as an engineer. In 1997, she finally was able to enter the work force: she qualified as a massage therapist to pay for the long, arduous process of becoming a Canadian nurse.

Two years ago, she applied to the Alberta Association of Registered Nurses, gathering together the documents necessary to complete the Assessment of Eligibility for Registration. She had to get in touch with her nursing school in Sarajevo and pay to have transcripts of her marks sent directly to the AARN.

The association asked her to take a course in English proficiency, and spend $2,000 on a one-year refresher program in nursing at a community college. She did both, only to be told she lacked credits in obstetrical and psychiatric nursing.

"I couldn't believe it. They asked me to go back and do these courses after all my many years of experience," Ms. Cerovsek says. "They said, 'According to your papers, you lack 35 hours of obstetrical nursing training in Sarajevo.' But I had thousands of hours of experience delivering babies, giving injections, assisting doctors in surgery and doing all kinds of nursing."

Ms. Cerovsek also planned to pursue geriatric nursing, and had no intention of working in a delivery room, or a psychiatric ward. "I had to spend several thousand more dollars taking these courses. At that point, I really felt like giving up because it seemed so bureaucratic."

Donna Hutton, executive director of the AARN, sympathizes but says the association is responsible for maintaining standards and is working "with the government and educational institutes to develop bridging programs for international nurses."

The perseverance that saw Ms. Cerovsek through the upheaval of Sarajevo is helping her through her marathon quest to become a nurse in a province that needs them. (Alberta has a shortage and in the next five years see 10 to 20 per cent of its nurses will reach retirement age.)

She recently completed the two courses and is ready to begin clinical training and preparing for the national exam. The process has taken four years, and cost about $6,000.

"I know so many nurses from Sarajevo who would become nurses tomorrow, but it's too expensive and complicated," she says. "My daughter came home from school and said, 'There is a huge shortage of nurses. Should I study nursing?'

"I told her, 'You should only do it if you really love it like I have.' It's been like my third child and I can't wait to get back to it."

Disillusioned doctors take some class action



Sunita Doobay was at the Montreal airport when she spied a handsome stranger. "He didn't want to talk to me. I talked to him," said Ms. Doobay, a tall, dark beauty.

The stranger turned out to be a family doctor from Brazil who was spending six months observing psychiatry treatments at Montreal General Hospital. They began dating and soon after, Ms. Doobay, a lawyer, proposed marriage.

"I'm the one who said, 'Come to Canada. You're really smart. You'll make it.' "

Her father, a cardiovascular surgeon in Toronto, advised otherwise. He told the couple to leave Canada.

"I thought, 'That couldn't be right,' " said Ms. Doobay, 38.

Father knew best. For five years, while the couple lived in Toronto, her husband focused all his skill and experience on passing the battery of exams required to qualify as a doctor in Ontario. Twice, he scored well on written tests. Twice, he took the clinical test and was rejected. Now, Ms. Doobay is filing what is believed to be the first foreign-doctors' class-action complaint with the Ontario Human Rights Commission. She is alleging systemic discrimination and asking for what she calls a "fair" exam, including videotaping the candidate during the clinical section, as is done in the United States. She also seeks punitive damages and compensation for suffering.

Her husband is not among the complainants. He has given up.

An estimated 4,000 foreign-trained physicians languish in Ontario, despite a doctor shortage that affects one in 10 residents. This year, accrediting bodies will choose 150 foreign doctors to practise in Ontario, compared with 75 last year and 50 in 2001.

The remaining thousands work at minimum-wage jobs such as delivering pizza or, if they are luckier, as orderlies in hospitals.

It's hard for us who scraped through high-school biology to understand their humiliation and despair. "We have been treating human beings in our country, not guinea pigs," said Dr. Rubeena Zafar, 45, a petite gynecologist from Pakistan. She and her husband arrived in 2002 to escape political strife. They wanted their four children to have a better future.

Canada encourages people such as Dr. Zafar to immigrate. But then it erects licensing barriers that take years to overcome, if ever. Incredibly, top scorers on the written exam aren't even guaranteed a spot in the subsequent round of clinical tests.

Take Dr. Emad Abdel-Malak. A year ago, the family doctor moved here from Cairo with his wife, also a general practitioner, and their two children. They bought a house in Mississauga. This spring, he quit his job pumping gas to devote himself to the written exams for family physicians. In April, he scored 77 per cent and his wife scored 73 per cent. The mean was 65.1 per cent.

Last month, the Ontario International Medical Graduate Clearinghouse sent him a letter. "Unfortunately, you have not been selected for an interview," it said, barring him from trying the second phase, the clinical test that includes taking patient histories, giving physical exams and providing diagnoses.

"I ranked, but they didn't choose me," said Dr. Abdel-Malak, 40. His wife wasn't chosen either. For her part, Dr. Zafar scored 77.9 per cent on the gynecologists exam, compared with a mean of 73.7. But like Dr. Abdel-Malak, she wasn't selected for the clinical stage. Ditto for another British-trained Pakistani gynecologist with 20 years experience, who scored 89 per cent.

"Every day I read in the papers that there is a doctor shortage," Dr. Zafar said bitterly. "What the hell am I doing here?"

Brad Sinclair, executive director of the Clearinghouse, wouldn't discuss individual cases. He said the criteria for proceeding to the clinical phase includes CVs, cover letters, medical-school marks, and research and teaching experience.

Surely, these documents were available to the Clearinghouse before the doctors took the written test. If it deemed them unfit to start with, why not cull candidates before the written exams and save them the grief? "It's a free country," Mr. Sinclair said. "They don't have to take the exam."

Ms. Doobay is hoping to obtain legal aid to pursue the complaint. "Otherwise, I'll do it pro bono," she said. "The case is important. It should be addressed."

She thinks she'll win too. In 2001, five foreign doctors, including two who staged hunger strikes, brought a similar complaint before the B.C. Council of Human Rights. In 2002, the council awarded compensation ranging from $7,500 to more than $60,000.

The Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons, once an obstacle to foreign doctors, is now urging expanded accreditation. That is cold comfort to Ms. Doobay's clients. Dr. Abdel-Malak is planning to move back to Cairo regardless of the outcome of the suit. "All my doctor friends back home ask me about my experience in Canada. My answer in two words: big lie."

Dr. Basel Mohsen, another member of the suit, passed the written exams two times. Twice, he has failed the clinical test. At 34, he said he'll give the exams one last shot, then move to the United States if he doesn't succeed. In hindsight, he wishes he had followed his younger brother, who left Toronto for Philadelphia in 2000. Both are medical graduates of the University of Damascus. But while Dr. Mohsen's parents are still supporting him, his brother starts the third year of a residency program for neurology next month. "He said, 'I'm not going to waste time here,' " Dr. Mohsen said.

As for Dr. Zafar, she says her husband, an electrical engineer, hasn't yet obtained a licence to work in Canada. In the meantime, he put their joint savings into a Toronto grocery store. His partners were three other engineers like himself. "Being engineers, they couldn't run a grocery store. It went down the drain," said Dr. Zafar, who helped out there until she had to study for her exam. Now, they're both unemployed and trying to figure out how much money, if any, they have left.

Last week, Ms. Doobay put up a For Sale sign at her Beaches home. She, her husband and their twin daughters, who turn 5 this month, are moving to Brazil, where her husband has numerous job offers waiting.

Ms. Doobay, a graduate of Queen's University and New York University law schools, won't be able to practise law in Brazil. She speaks fluent Dutch, but not Portuguese. And like her husband here, she faces professional barriers there.

Still, she's trying to keep her law practice alive by commuting to Toronto once a month. "It's only 9½ hours, and it's at night," she said, "so I can sleep on the plane."

***Yes, the environment is clean here but every other kid is smoking here.

1st) Smoking in childrens depends upon the atmosphere in house. If a father is smoking in front of his kids then do u think that kid will not learn how to smoke, similar for drinking. It doesn't matter u r in which part of the world.
2nd) friend circle is very important now days, childrens in India too have different groups and u can't blame canadians for this.

***If you call kids are independant just because they start working in McDonalds or Tim's & spend their earning over the wkend & again work for the whole wk & later on stuck in those stores for the rest of their lives, I believe that you really really have this 'foreign country' fever.

1st) This is what is called canadian experience dude, u need to have work experience in every field, doesn't matter u r a millioniar or a laborer. as long as u don't learn how to make a living by working from ur hands u will not be succefull in long term. and this is thing what employers prefer in canadians over desi. atleast childrens here make their own way. and live on their own terms, atleast they don't blame like I had seen many kids do back home.

2nd) If u call this canada fever then may be u r right. but I am more happy here then back home, neither I blame India nor Canada. I am simply saying where I am happy. and most of my family memebers in USA and Canada reach the heights which they had only dream off, and that is only because of hard work by us. and most of us had not forgot our India, we all in someway or the other our supporting backhome. and thats y I still say, that y don't people who curse Canada one way or the other leave Canada.

***Do you mean that as long as they come & tell their parents that they are spending weekend or vacation together, it is all right. If the 16 year daughter comes to her parents & tells that she is pregnant it is all right because she is telling her parents. As long as they come & tell the parents that they are gay. right??In white families also it is the biggest issue right now, they are scared of the fact of having young kids in the family.


1st) this I will still say depends on how u keep ur childrens, I had already discuss the importance of sex education for 2days gen kids. atleast they will know the precautions and we as parents play important role in this. no matter u r in Canada or India. we should be frank to our kids, if girls then mothers shoul be close to them and for boys it should be dad. but both parents should teach childrens the diseases, precautions and other aspects of sex. and if u don't beleive me then please as any doctor, every one will tell u same thing that parents play imp role in kids life. we should be able to give them time and listen to them like good listeners, and then discussing with them day to day life.
2nd) comeone dude, u r in 2005. u should know that its not the fault of individual if one is gay or lesbian. it is the characterstics genes of parents which make them so and we should accept this change. take an ex, if a father genes comes in child for sex then he becomes boy but if the likeness characterstics of mother comes in the same boy then later on he may get attracted to guys then girls. and for this u can't blame that child. please accept this change man.

***Nobody supports this behavior but you can't defend Canadian rude & spoiled youngster by telling these stories from India.

yeah nobody supports such behavior, but if I can't defend canadians then u also can't blame canadians for their behavior. cause like above it all depends on the parents teachings, no matter the kid is canadian or indian.

***Are u born outside of India???

bro by growing mentally I mean most of the childrens decision in their life are taken by parents backhome, here they take their own decisions. cause they earn for themselves. and u also know what a difference it makes in life when u r exposing to outer world, and budget ur expenditure.

***It is not kids' choice, it is parents who want their kids to go to university & have proper degree & till then they support the kids on the other hand, north american parents kick out their kids as soon as they are 16 & ask them to pay themselves for their education. I would always say that it is a privilege that we get support from our parents till we finish our education

as u said it is parents wich that their childrens become engineers, doctors and go to univ. this is what I dislike most, childrens should be allowed to make their own way, doesn't matter if he wants to do job or study. and if he says he want to study then we should support him. otherwise he can join a job, earn for his living and do whatever he wishes. we should not impose our values and traditions on them. yeah it is privilege for childrens that their parents support them, but for how long? one day they have to get out in this world, and earn for themselves. but yeah if child needs money for his/her studies then we as a parents should never turn our back to them. no matter if we are indians or canadians.

***The only big issue about your above statement is you don't have young daughter right now & as a parent to know that she has a boyfriend is very nice & normal but no Indian parent can allow their daughter to spend vacation with her bf & I don't think there is any need of changing in this case.

bro I have only one daughter and no boy, u r right that its hard for parents to allow them to go on vacations with her bf. but here I would say that if she start earning for herself then I can allow mock marriage to her. and will not interfere in her life, but as I said as parent we play imp role in their life. if I will not allow her to play with boys in neighbour hood, maybe she may turn up thinking that she is a girl. so I will always keep my girl as a boy child and will give her all those gifts which other parents give their boys. maybe me as a parent will be more frank to her then some parents, but still I will say that if u love ur childs then in return they too will love u, and will not do anything from which u as a person is hurt.

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Learn from past mistakes, Plan for future, Live in Present by Duncan

If you have already made up your mind to allow your daughter a mock marriage & you believe tht smoking comes from home & not the peer pressure, then you should better be here & not in India.

An article from the website "TheStar.com" written by Haroon Siddiqui.

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Missing links in Martin manifesto
We must make better use of our citizens' ties to China, India, says Haroon Siddiqui




HAROON SIDDIQUI


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On the eve of the return of Parliament tomorrow, Paul Martin has seen the future: With an aging population, we need more immigrants; must better manage our changing demography; and find ways to benefit from emerging economic giants China and India, which also happen to be our main sources of immigration.

He is absolutely right.

There's no point in pillorying him for lack of policy specifics. When a leader gets the big picture right, details follow.

If he's to be faulted, it is for being prosaic where he needs to be poetic to stir the public, and for misreading some tea leaves, while missing others, such as how to deal with Muslims.

Rather than lead the world on the latter, as only we can with the calm clarity that comes from being a model nation, Ottawa has been driven mostly by the desire to please the Bush administration, and, therefore, by panic and prejudice, stoked by the cottage industry of fear-mongers who benefit from it.

On immigration, there's a national consensus that we need more. Or, we will suffer:

A population decline and all its attendant economic problems (whom do you sell cars, condos, houses, loans, etc. to?).

Skills shortages (in 10 years, all net growth in the labour force will come from immigrants).

A shrinking base of taxpayers to pay for health and pensions of an expanding roster of retirees.

But even the good things of life have to be managed. Lately, we haven't managed immigration well. Not because of racism, per se. Nor multiculturalism, as the neo-cons moan. On both fronts, we do better than anybody else in the world. Vive le Canada.

Nor is the problem, as alluded to by Martin, the urban-rural split, caused mostly by immigrants clustering in the cities, which, not coincidentally, are driving the economy and creating our post-modern culture.

Propping up the rural economy, as Martin seemed to suggest, is to throw good money after bad. While our vast land mass will continue to shape our psyche, and will be there for recreation and retirement, it will generate less and less wealth.

Despite their central role in our collective well-being, immigrants are not achieving their full economic potential as quickly as they used to, even though they are the most educated ever to come our way.

That's because the Canadian-born are also highly educated. And entry-level jobs, where immigrants used to start, have disappeared under restructuring.

All the more reason to recognize the education and work experience of the foreign-born, and get them into jobs commensurate with their skills. That would also be a cheaper and quicker way to fix our other competitive problem, productivity, rather than engineering more corporate tax breaks.

"We cannot allow entrenched interests to continue to block progress," Martin said of the professional and trade associations that keep newcomers out.

We are also failing, due to the Harris-Eves era cutbacks, to give English-language and other initial help to those who need it. We can see the effects in the pockets of Toronto's underclass.

I am told that a federal-provincial agreement on immigration, stalled by Mike Harris and Ernie Eves, is, at last, ready. Under the M2 Accord (for Martin and Dalton McGuinty), Ottawa, which now gives only $800 per immigrant for settlement, will pay $3,000, about the same as to Quebec. Most of this new money should go to the NGOs in the field, not bigger bureaucracy.

That China and India are the next economic frontier is clear enough. The U.S. represents a fifth of the world's economy with less than 5 per cent of the population. China and India are as strong economically but have 40 per cent of the population. "So it's clear where the growth potential lies," Martin said.

Problem is, we are a trading nation but not a nation of traders.

With the U.S. next door, we don't explore new markets. Attempts by Pierre Trudeau to diversify to the Pacific and Europe failed. That's why Martin talked mostly about selling "oil, gas and nuclear." Expect a new push to sell reactors and get tankers lining up on the West Coast.

He didn't talk about what can get us the biggest breakthrough: the Chinese and Indian diasporas here — 1 million strong each, educated and entrepreneurial.

Overall, Martin's message is clear: The future will belong to those who can deal across cultures, races and religions, both at home and abroad. Monocultural, even bicultural, individuals, businesses and public institutions will fall by the wayside.


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Haroon Siddiqui writes Thursday and Sunday.

Thanks & regards.

Rajan.

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Let's make India a better place !

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Orginally posted by charles3


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U talked about rest of desi's reading newspapers, pls. read for urself first. U can murder a person in this country and get away with max. 1 yr in jail and then u can apply for payroll and then enjoy urself again. That's why now most offenses done by Canadians in US, the US is not allowing them to come back to Canada, because they know these ppl. will go scott free.

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hinglish zindabad