I’m moving to Montréal, Canada ??!
It’s quite a change after living for the last 4 years in Paris. We decided to move Manon and me, for multiple reasons:
- We both wanted to live outside of France for at least a few years. I already lived in the UK, Manon in the USA, now was our chance to live elsewhere together
- Manon got her PhD in late 2019 and needed to work in another country for her research career
But why Montréal? We didn’t want to stay in Europe, it was too close to France and we wanted to live further away. We went on holiday in the Québec province in 2017 during 3 weeks and we liked it a lot. It’s also an important city for machine learning. Finally, it has a vibrant international community and the Québec province is very close in term of culture and social benefits to France.
Moving to another countries involves a lot of planning and changes. I’ve tried to draft a list of pros/cons and goals.
Pros/goals
- Discovering another country and culture. Fitting in. I’m very happy to discover in depth a non-european culture. As a public servant, I’m also looking forward to understand how Canada works in terms of government, politics and policies.
- Speaking English. Bilingualism is important to Canadians, and this is something I’m attached to as well. Most canadians are native English, I’m native French so for me it’ll be a chance to get better at speaking English. And speaking québecois as well!
- Traveling in America. While living in Europe, we’ve explored mostly european countries, while going once or twice to America or Asia. I’m looking forward to traveling in America, there is much to do!
- Different weather, as Canada is known for its cold winters. For now, I find it really enjoyable: Montréal under the snow is beautiful and it’s sunny and dry!
- Discovering new food.
Cons/goals
- Moving to another flat, filling administrative forms. I don’t find packing stuff, moving out, looking for a flat, ordering furnitures really enjoyable. We also had a ton of administrative things to take care of (immigration, health insurance, banks etc). It has been often long and stressful.
- Staying connected to family and friends
- Meeting new people, making new friends
- Having enough time off to travel
I’m looking forward to being a proud canadian resident and enjoying our time here!