Anthony

I happened to come across this article. Interesting and encouraging story
for prospective immigrants. Thought I wanted to share.


http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServerpagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&call_pageid=971358637177&c=Article&c id=1072134611159

Happy ending to a story I covered five years ago
`Canada has so much to offer,' family finds


ALLAN THOMPSON

While on a reporting assignment for the Star in Moscow over the Christmas
holidays in 1998, I interviewed an immigrant family about to make the move
to Canada. Natalya Kotikova and her husband, Pyotr Syomin, were
university-educated computer engineers with a 7-year-old son, Sasha. "We are
optimists. I hope we'll find something in Toronto," Kotikova told me. I lost
track of the family until I received this e-mail from Natalya. (In the
process of trying to fit in in Canada, they have all changed their first
names. Natalya has become Natalie, Pyotr has become Peter and Sasha, now an
impetuous 12-year-old, insists on being called Alex because kids told him
Sasha was a girl's name.)

Dear Allan,

Five years ago, you showed up in my tiny apartment in a southwestern suburb
of Moscow with questions regarding our decision to immigrate to Canada. We
talked about our motives, the future, but little did we know about Canada
and even less did we expect.

When you published an article about our family, we were taken by surprise by
the phone calls we received. People called us offering help with settling
down upon our arrival.

Unfortunately, owing to a language barrier, we could not even thank all
these people, let alone use their help. The only real help came from the
Internet.

With a list of cheap motels in our hands and bracing ourselves for the
worst, we boarded a plane to Toronto.

That's how, on a cold evening in March, 1999, we found ourselves standing at
the exit of Pearson airport, carrying two suitcases and a backpack with our
7-year-old's toys.

It has been an amazing journey. Sharing an apartment downtown with people we
hardly knew, relying on a food bank, going to ESL classes every morning and
having a $40 weekly limit on groceries â€