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2025-09-29 0
Fun how Canada if against these fraudes 79k person But when Lebanon decided to kick the 2.5Millions Syrians in Lebanon 4.5 M lebanese who. Has no papers only 300k have legal papers no rights and even confirmed by the UNHCR , and that we have no data for their criminal record and they create lot of crimes and when its in their advantage all one them goes for holidays in Syria " while its supposed to be dangerous" Canada opposed on returning them . Hahah stupid government I think I will support these fraudulent indian lol * nah I dont support them * but you need to be fair , you dont wanna take those Syrians no country wanted them and you dont want Lebanon to return them
2023-11-13 0
1) Toronto is poor value. Getting housing of any kind (buying or renting) is stupidly expensive. And the quality you get for the price is lousy. Especially the newer builds, which are just thrown up as quickly as possible and sold to investors. Policy measures generally all seem to serve to just inflate the price of housing further. The occasional lip service given to affordability is amusing, but ultimately sad. There are lots of people who really do not want the housing bubble to pop. They will fight against it with all they have.\n\n2) It has become kind of boring. There is lots to do if you have money, but it’s harder to find entertainment on a budget. Even the free stuff like parks are filling up. Stuff like sporting events, eating out, going out is very costly across the board. Even the “cheaper” stuff is expensive. It seems like a lot of local culture is disappearing. Even the cool neighbourhoods are filling up with the same chains. I think the high commercial rent and bureaucracy is deflating a lot of would-be entrepreneurs. Most landowners seem to just be banking on cashing out their land for condos.\n\n3) Canada overall has a high cost of living compared to salaries. In the US you can find lower cost of living areas that still give you a real city experience. And in Europe you can be poor but still live a decent, if no frills, life. In Canada the basic necessities are all expensive. Phone bills, grocery bills, rent, insurance are through the roof. Domestic travel is expensive. And the dollar sucks if you want to travel abroad. Health care is free but good luck finding a family doctor or waiting 8 hours in the ER these days. It’s expensive to be poor, or even middle class.\n\n4) Most of the Greater Toronto Area, outside the core, is soulless suburbs with awful transit - very “American” except with worse traffic congestion. You will need a car, which is another huge cost. Row upon row of old cookie cutter suburbs with the same crappy houses. Good luck walking anywhere, and if you do you will need to walk down boring, treeless arterial roads with cars zooming past right beside you, and cross giant eight lane intersections that were never built for humans on foot. In a rainstorm or on a fall evening you have to be really careful not to be run over by aggressive drivers.\n\n5) It is hard to raise a family in an apartment here. You can do it but it’s not very easy, and also you are still kind of judged for it. Lots of young people are feeling stuck and are deferring or avoiding starting a family. Buying any type of house, even a basic townhouse, requires pledging your soul to a bank by taking a massive mortgage with eye watering debt in a volatile market. But few apartment buildings have the kind of sensible gentle density, the family unit sizes and the common amenities, like little courtyards with jungle gyms, that you might find in Europe. No one ever contemplated that anyone would ever desire to raise kids in an apartment. It’s just a cultural thing that has worked its way into how things are planned and designed.\n\n6) The transit system is ok by North American standards but awful by international standards. There are only two real subway lines, one stub line, one line that is permanently out of service after a derailment, and another line that was supposed to open a couple years ago but still has no date for opening. The subways go out of service frequently, sometimes for the dumbest reasons, and then it is a zoo of shuttle buses. The streetcars are nice but so slow. The buses are fine if you find yourself dreaming about riding a daily herky jerky rolling tin of sardines. They are building a lot of transit but it will take decades to get done.\n\n7) There is still a lot of cool multiculturalism and opportunities to experience different foods and cultures - one of the best things about Toronto. Increasingly though it seems to be losing the fun vibe of the 90s, when everyone celebrated each other’s backgrounds and was chill. It seems the immigration is not as broad based anymore and also people are importing a lot of their “old country” grievances here. The immigration system also kind of preys on people abroad by selling them a false fairy tale, so they end up dejected when they arrive and see how things really are.\n\n8) This one might be controversial but it’s kind of an ugly city. There’s nothing particularly of historical meaning or value. Some of the older neighbourhoods are kind of nice, but the last 25 years they have only built giant glass skyboxes, one after another. There aren’t the cool “missing middle” walkups like in NY, Chicago or Montreal (or even LA). There are very few buildings with much architectural character. Some of the buildings they deem “heritage” here are an embarrassment.\n\n9) For safety, honestly on this score I think Toronto is not bad. There are not too many real “ghettos” and it’s night and day compared to much of the US. With that said, there is more vagrancy and social issues these days, with tents and such. It’s very sad but the shelters are full, lots of homeless go into the libraries, parks and transit system. It does make it harder to enjoy these public amenities safely. It is nowhere close to Europe where you might let your kids run free around town. Canadian parents still helicopter their kids and the place again is not designed to really be safe for kids, in the same way as Europe.\n\n10) Finally, a bit of a double edged sword. Toronto had a lot of youthful energy - people coming here from all over. It is definitely not as sleepy as many parts of the world. With that said, it is becoming a bit of a transient place (minus the world class experiences like London or NY). If you are from elsewhere you might find it hard making and keeping friends. I’ve seen lots of people struggle because it’s is hard to build a strong social network. We have a very “shallow” culture here - people are extremely polite but not overly warm and hospitable. We treat one another kind of like neighbours - meaning we’d like to have a cordial, drama-free coexistence and otherwise kind of stick to ourselves.
2023-07-16 0
Tyler, thanks for your entertaining and fun videos. My grandfather is a dual citizen but has never renewed his passport or anything and when asked to do so, he outright refuses. He says he hated living there. We live in the Vancouver area of Canada right now. My wife is finishing her registered nursing degree and we are considering moving to washington state, within an hour or so of the Canadian border on temporary work visas (TN1) for a few years. The main reason is the cost of living differences, mostly in housing but a lot of things are cheaper down there too. For example though, the costs of rent or to buy a house in the Vancouver area is insane - 1.5 million is generally a starting point. The cost of a detached house south of the border between Bellingham and Blaine starts around $400,000 ($500,000 CDN). If renting, it's crazy cheaper than here. \n\nThe area we are considering going to is very close to the canadian border, I've never heard of major violence problems in the area. Like one of the other comments you read, we're basically considering moving there to take advantage of a lower cost of living and higher salaries for a bit to try to get ahead. Living in the Vancouver area is such an absolute DRAIN on our finances that it is intolerable. If we didn't move to the US, we'd have to find another place in Canada to go to, but we do like the climate on the coast here. I'd actually just keep commuting to Canada daily to work in Canada since it's so close to the border, and writing the bar exam to be able to practice law in any US state except California, Massachusets, or New York is a pain in the backside to even be able to write it, let alone prepare for it. Just easier for me to keep working here unless we decided to try to make a permanent move somewhere further from the border.\n\nIf we decided to change our minds and apply to stay in the US in the future, there are a lot of the other considerations that other people have raised on top of my own ability to continue as a lawyer. Gun violence in the US is crazy, extreme polarized political views and increasing intolerance against diversity of race, culture, religion, (and while it doesnt affect us directly, it bothers us how LGBTQ people are increasingly targeted with backwards policies and by certain segments of the public), the health care system in canada has it's problems but it's also got it's strong points. We'll never go bankrupt because of a health care issue since we can move back to Canada IF it's ever a problem. Thankfully we are all pretty healthy so it shouldn't be much of a problem for a while at least. And we wouldn't even move there at all if her employment as a nurse doesn't offer health care and better pay than she can obtain here. \n\nOur kids will probably attend post-secondary (college/university) in Canada as dual citizens unless they get a scholarship to a top US school. The costs of post-secondary in Canada appears to be much cheaper than in the US and we have some good colleges/universities that consistently rank high globally.
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