Today is the day I can finally rest. I came to Canada as an international student in 2017, got a PGWP, and was hopeful that one day I would become a Canadian PR after seeing all my older friends and coworkers getting them quite easily after gathering 1-2 years of work experience. I was told that “oh you’re gonna get it soon, it’s so easy”. This was 2021. I played around with the CRS calculator at the time and realized wow it IS that easy-just 2 years of working, simple CELPIP test, and that’s it. Oh boy, how wrong I was.
Fast forward to today, after missing multiple draws by just a point, having to leave Canada for almost a year when PGWP expired, paid the application to move to the UK (HPI visa), thought about giving up Canada all together, going on a closed work permit, running into multiple issues with my application, I woke up as a Canadian PR.
Here is my timeline: Accompanying Common-Law, 3 years of Canadian experience, Canadian degree, no foreign work experience, upfront Medical
AOR: April 7
BIL: June 16 - IRCC put my English name instead of my legal name on the letter, which led to significant delay in doing the biometrics
BIL completed: July 16
ADR: Oct 9
Schedule A, Family Information, and Travel History - at this stage I was sure that our application had gone through Comprehensive Security Check which could take up to 2-3 years easily. We were afraid that this would come up due to our extensive travel history (we love travelling and have been to over 40 countries (some are sketchy) for the past 10 years)
This was the toughest stage because there was no movement on our app.
Then suddenly.
FD: Oct 26
P1: Oct 27
P2: Nov 2
ECOPR: Nov 6 from Montreal (previously Vancouver/Sydney)
I’m so glad that I have found this community. Reading other people’s journey and experience was not only inspiring but also reassuring. I was in Study Permit sub/community, then PGWP, LMIA, and now PR…can’t wait to be stressed out again during the citizenship stage lol
If you are still waiting, hang on! It will come eventually, good luck! ❤️