GITA
Professional In Education, Resident for Several Years, Immigrant from South Asia, 40s
“Four years we have been here. We are originally from India and we lived in the Middle East for some years. I have children. . .We came for landing. We stayed for a month in Edmonton in 2005 and then the same year, we came here. My husband got a job and he moved with the job. . .We can’t become a citizen [in the Middle East], we can’t buy any property [in the Middle East]…Taxes are higher [here in Canada]. Half of our salary goes in that. It took a while for us to get used to this system because we were so very comfortable there and never worried about things. And even for like going back to India, every year they give you the flight charges, so we never worried about our flight tickets. [There is nothing like that here] because you are a resident, after a while you are a citizen here. [Here you are] poorer. You have to do everything by yourself, everything. The only thing is, the freedom of your life is here. There is a freedom for the practice of your religion [in Canada]…We are like gypsies; we are gone somewhere, live somewhere, now we are here. I don’t know next where we are going to be... What’s our identity? Especially for our kids. They can’t say that “I’m Indian” like you know because they are not born in India and after some time when they get their citizenship they are called Canadians but they are not white. What is their identity?”
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Mapping Life in Fort McMurray 