Cultural environment

Benefits: Canada is a relatively equal society. No matter what job you hold, what job you do, or how much wealth you have, you are naturally equal in this country. Even if you are a public official, you are actually serving everyone. There is no special power, only due obligations.

The mayor has to line up when he goes out to do errands. Even if he squeezes the subway, no one will take a high look at giving a seat to a special person. Through the redistribution of social resources in the superstructure, the rich have to pay more taxes, so that the poor can receive relief funds and various subsidies. The poor will never have to worry about having no money to look down on the disease, and their children cannot afford to go to school.

Although Canadians pay a lot of various taxes each year, the effect of the return can be seen in all aspects of life. Every community park in the city is clean and beautifully maintained. The community library and activity centre are fully equipped. The snow shoveler will spread salt in time to clean the road surface. If the pavement bricks have raised corners, they will be smoothed. , No matter how remote the rest area of ​​the park is, there are toilets with toilet paper. Public beaches in summer are equipped with safe ambulance personnel. Many parks are equipped with fitness equipment, automatic drinking fountains, and restrooms.

Note:
Many things in Canada are definitely slower than in other countries. Everything is subject to repeated discussions. For example, Toronto’s proposal to build a short subway extension line is so beneficial and harmless. It has been studied and discussed for many years. It has not yet entered the implementation stage, and even the drawings have not been discussed and finalized.

Because the two places have different national conditions, different laws and policies, different environmental atmospheres, and different working styles, the work has been on track in the past, and when you come to Canada, you may need to start from scratch or even encounter situations where you cannot find a job. If you have a bad mentality, you can’t lower your posture, and you want to have the same sense of existence as before, it’s basically impossible.

Working Environment

Benefits: Canada’s attitude towards talented international talents is welcome and recognized. It places great emphasis on professional skills certificates and the work experience of well-known companies. In comparison, the same educational background is better than work experience, and the same work experience is better than a certificate! A professional certificate is easier to find a job than a master or doctor with no work experience, and even a technical school graduate with work or internship experience is easier to find a job than a just graduated master!

Regardless of the background of the immigrants, as long as you put in enough effort, you can always earn a decent life. There will be immigrants from various countries around the world working together in every company in Canada. Although everyone has different skin colours, beliefs, and living habits, they can basically respect each other in the workplace. There is less intrigue in our workplace politics.

Everyone divides work and life very clearly. They work during the day and get paid and come home from get off work to enjoy life. I don’t like to take home the negative aspects of work. Home is the harbour of life. Work is just to make money. There is no need to complicate simple things. Therefore, working here is not so much pressure on interpersonal relationships, and it is suitable for simple and happy people.

Note: New immigrants who come to Canada to find a job often have some work experience, especially skilled immigrants and skilled immigrants, who themselves apply for immigration based on their own work experience as a bonus standard. However, after successful immigration, the previous work in the country is not recognized by employers in most cases in Canada.

Because the two places have different national conditions, different laws and policies, different environmental atmospheres, and different working styles, the work has been on track in the past, and when you come to Canada, you may need to start from scratch or even encounter situations where you cannot find a job. If you have a bad mentality, you can’t lower your posture, and you want to have the same sense of existence as before, it’s basically impossible.

Person-to-person relationship

Canadians are warm, direct, polite and honest, so they are relaxed and happy when getting along with most Canadians. If you want to socialize with Canadians, it usually means chatting on different occasions. Normal friends usually don’t have a deeper relationship, and they don’t often have dinner and accommodation at your home and my home after having a good chat like a Chinese.

Canadians pay more attention to privacy and keep a certain distance from each other. They will not whisper to each other when they talk. Normally they will keep a distance of more than 1.5 meters. If they are neighbours who may stand at their door 5 meters and 8 meters away, they can talk for half a day. Leave a certain amount of personal space and do not disturb other people’s lives.

Canadians value themselves and their families most. Canada talks about rules, no favours, no treats or gifts, and no one has to think about going to the back door to ask people to do things and jump in the queue. Everything is done in business, no matter what the title is, you should queue up and be fined.

In particular, working as a civil servant in Canada does not have any superior treatment. It is just a type of work that serves the people. It will neither be higher than ordinary people’s wages nor can you have any grey income. If found, they will be convicted and dismissed. This kind of job is not very attractive in Canada. Most of them are applied by people who desire mediocrity and have no higher pursuit of career development.

Canadians’ emphasis on privacy and the preservation of each other’s space makes it difficult for many people who like to lively to adapt. Sometimes there are a lot of people in the park, but it is quite quiet. Everyone likes to enjoy the beautiful scenery quietly, rarely chatting and not making loud noises.

Giving gifts in Canada is very offensive, and it may even lead to nothing wrong. Here, everything is done according to the rules, and doing things peacefully is the right way. The more evil thoughts there are, the less able to achieve the goal. The idea of ​​being accustomed to relying on relationships to handle everything is not working here.

Daily consumption

Benefits: Life in Canada is very convenient in both cities and towns. There are a lot of supermarkets of various types. There are shopping malls and shopping centres in every community. Some franchised stores specialize in building materials, home furnishings, flowers, daily necessities, cosmetics, medicines, kitchenware, lamps, etc. There are also small 1 yuan and 2 yuan shops that sell everything and the quality is good.

For Chinese, Chinese supermarkets like Vancouver and Toronto are a one-stop-shop for all Asian daily commodities. There is no feeling of going abroad in these supermarkets. Most of the customers and sales staff are Chinese. There are almost all domestic products here. There are all of them, and the ones that are not available for the time being may appear on the shelves if you visit again after a while.

There are also some Chinese self-owned shopping malls, which mainly sell domestic products with a complete range of products, and they are also cheaper than local Canadian prices. Many foreigners also like to go shopping. Therefore, when you come to live in Canada, you don’t need to worry about not being able to buy domestic products.

And there are many daily necessities in Canada even if multiplied by the exchange rate, they are still cheaper than domestic products of the same quality. Nowadays, a meat dumpling in China has been sold for more than 20 yuan, and I would think that Canada has 6 or 7 yuan a sufficient amount of beef. Burgers are really not expensive.

Note:

Although Canadian prices are not expensive compared to income, for new immigrants, no matter what they buy in the first period of time, they always love to multiply the exchange rate by 5 to calculate the price. In this way, everything is expensive, and it feels much more expensive than domestically. Besides basic agricultural and sideline products, everything is taxed, especially the tax on tobacco and alcohol.

There is also the prevailing tipping culture in North America. If you want to tip less than 15%, you need to think about whether the service and dishes are really bad. If it is said in the past, it is better not to be so stingy. After all, people rely on this income to support their families. of.

There is absolutely no way for e-commerce here to compare with China. It’s impossible to do everything with just a mobile phone when you go out. It is still a world of cash and credit cards. It seems that it is still in the business form of more than ten years ago. This is mainly because of the people in the Western world. Pay more attention to privacy and property security. Internet transactions have a great risk of personal information leakage.

Housing and automobile-related

Benefit:

The types of houses here can be roughly divided into apartments, detached houses, semi-detached houses, townhouses, etc. The traditional Asian concept is that a house is called home, so most Hong Kong people and mainlanders who immigrate to Canada try to buy a house as soon as possible.
The houses here have real property rights, which means that as long as the annual land tax is paid on time, the land belongs to the buyer permanently. The homeowner is free to plant flowers and plants on his own land, build a swimming pool, and fully experience the landlord’s control right. The amount of land tax is related to the estimated market value of your house and the annual expenditure budget of the local government. The land tax notice letter twice a year clearly lists the proportion and amount of various expenditures.

Here is a mention of daily expenses such as house water, electricity, gas, internet phone, etc. Except for water and electricity bills that are charged by centralized management, many providers like gas internet phones and cable TV can choose from, which one is cheaper for activities or services. OK, you can make a call to change it at any time, it’s very convenient to get it in different types.

Canadian car prices are currently cheaper than those in Hong Kong and the Mainland, and the same car configuration will be higher and of better quality. The second-hand car market is also very prosperous. Canadians change cars more frequently. Affected by sales and marketing strategies, generally speaking, many people change cars every 3 years. Therefore, many cars are very new in condition and they are in the best condition just after the running-in period. Resold at the time. There are many second-hand car markets with price concessions close to new cars, saving money and cost-effective!

Note:

The houses in Canada are beautiful with land, which is really enjoyable! However, the cost of housing in Canada should be the highest expenditure in the cost of living. According to the latest report, housing expenditure in Vancouver has already accounted for 98% of the average income of Vancouver residents. Toronto is also close to 70%, while most other cities are around 30%.

Housing expenses mainly include loans, insurance, land tax and daily decoration and maintenance. But keeping a house requires a lot of time and money. Some houses with management fees do not need to be repaired and maintained by themselves. The more expensive the house, the more maintenance costs need to be invested. There is a lot of equipment that needs to be regularly maintained inside and outside the house and the infrastructure needs to be replaced irregularly. If you do it, you can start at $100.

Moreover, land tax is required to be paid, and the price of land tax is determined according to the superiority of the geographical location and some comprehensive factors. When you buy a house, you will know the land tax price of the year, and sometimes it will fluctuate. Every year, you will receive a land tax price list and payment time from the government. You can pay the fee online or give it a check. The general house property tax is between 4000 and 10000 Canadian dollars, and luxury houses are discussed separately, and there is no upper limit.

Canada’s second-largest fixed cost of living is even car-related expenses. In particular, the car insurance in Toronto is ridiculously high, and gasoline prices have risen again and again. Car repair and maintenance costs are not low, mainly due to higher labour costs, so in order to save money, many Canadians have taught themselves the craft and can do it by themselves without spending money to hire people.

Gasoline costs at least a few hundred dollars a month. Although Canada is an oil-producing country, the current price is not low, about 1.3 yuan. Last year it was only about one yuan, and the price has been increasing. So keeping a car and a house is a big expense.

History is preserved

Benefits: Although the founding history of Canada is only 151 years old, a large number of historical sites and buildings are very well preserved. Some small towns not only maintain very new buildings one or two hundred years ago, but also formulate relevant laws and regulations to manage them, and they are not allowed to arbitrarily rebuild or demolish these historical buildings that represent Canadian culture.

Although some of these buildings are still private property, they are still required to maintain the most original architectural appearance. When they need to be repaired, they will also use the closest similar materials. Therefore, many houses, churches, train stations, etc. now look the same. It was exactly the same a hundred years ago, and still very strong.

Canadians’ emphasis on history is also reflected in various large and small museums. There are National History Museum, Royal Museum, War Museum, Science and Technology Museum, Footwear History Museum, Aviation Museum, etc. It seems that Canadians have preserved everything that can be preserved.

In order to let people understand the past history, many museums will be opened every year for free, so that more people have the opportunity to understand the history and culture of this land. Many Canadians themselves are collectors of historical objects. They treasure all kinds of exquisite porcelain, paintings, musical instruments, handicrafts, and even Barbie dolls and toy dolls shipped from Britain, Italy, France, China and other countries many years ago. , Jewelry, clothing, etc. They keep these antiques as good as new, and their home has become a small museum.

Lament the Canadians’ respect and love for history!

Note:

The founding history of Canada is not long, it is still very young for a country! This land has not experienced a long history of five thousand years like China. It does not have the splendid history and culture of China and its former glory. There is neither Beijing nor Xi’an, an ancient capital full of dynasty change stories, nor Suzhou and Hangzhou. There are cultural hubs where stories and legends are spread everywhere.

The cultural characteristics of all the places in the tour are very similar, and it will inevitably be some aesthetic fatigue if you see too much, so you have to turn your attention to nature. Although Canadians always strive to emphasize their own cultural independence, they cannot escape the shadows of Britain, France, and the United States. After all, the formation of cultural independence is not a matter of overnight.

The above are some of my personal knowledge of this land in the past two years since I immigrated to Canada. Many of the impressions left during the initial landing have also changed over time. Some people who were not accustomed to the place when they first arrived have solidified into a part of life, and some things that were originally particularly exciting have become accustomed to them.

Frankly speaking, there is no country where everything is perfect, and all good and bad are not absolute. What really determines the happiness of an immigrant’s life is whether you can accept the new environment, integrate yourself into the local life, and accept all her strengths and weaknesses.

 

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