First 100 days - part one

Well, we've now been living in Vancouver for 100 days, so it's well past time for a bit of an update! It seems like only yesterday that we were packing up our life and flying over here, but, weirdly, it also feels like we've been here a lot longer.

We actually blasted through a lot of the admin-type tasks in the first week, while others are still ongoing - the joys of CIC bureaucracy.

So, list time!

Flight

• We flew with Canadian Affair - so much cheaper than the other options, even with upgrading to a Club seat.
• I'm glad that I got the Travel Document, as I was asked if I had one when our passports were checked in Glasgow. Whether not having one would have caused a problem, I don't know, but I was very pleased to just be able to flash it at them, then head through to security :)

Apartment

• We rented an AirBnB apartment for our first month - right downtown so we could walk everywhere. I highly recommend doing this, rather than being in a hotel. I felt that we were starting to actually live here, rather than being on vacation. And even though my first few trips to the supermarket totally freaked me out, I did like being able to cook in my own kitchen.
• The only issues we had were that the apartment was really set up for people on much shorter stays. For example, the cupboards were pretty much all full, so there was nowhere for our stuff to go! If you were staying for a fortnight, no problem - and the pantry essentials would have been handy. For two people with three suitcases each, who wanted to be able to do a proper shop, not so much!
• Also, while the late summer weather was gorgeous, the apartment got roastingly hot. Luckily, there was a balcony to sit out on and we took advantage of the seawall being so nearby.
• And I'm glad that we spent some time living the downtown life - it confirmed that we wanted somewhere a bit larger and much quieter!

Mobile phone

• Pretty much the first thing we did was to get our mobile phones organised. We were planning to just get Canadian SIM cards, but my iPhone was too old for the network we chose, so I ended up with a new Android (it's a hard life!).
• We got a really good package with all inclusive phone, texts and data. Voicemail is a bit weird though, as it's treated like a fancy extra, rather than as a standard thing.
• Tim also set us up with our own UK VOIP numbers, so friends and family can call a local Aberdeen number and it goes straight to our phones.

SIN

• Getting a Social Insurance Number (i.e. the Canadian equivalent of National Insurance, required for getting a job) was probably the simplest thing I had to do.
• Walk in to a Service Canada office with your identification documents, ask for a SIN, complete some forms and walk out with your number!
• The plastic card was posted out a week or so later.

Bank account / credit card

• Setting up bank accounts and credit cards was fairly simple too - helped by the fact that Tim's sister works for a bank over here and was able to speak to the new account people for us initially :)
• However, as we didn't have credit scores in Canada, we did have to put down security deposits for everything, but we'll get the money released in a year.
• The Canadians really don't do free banking, but the accounts we've got are actually only $7 a month and that's just if your balance drops below a certain amount - I think I can cope with that.
• There was quite a lot of "right, so how does that work then?" when we were setting up the accounts, as they do things very different here! Like being able to access your account in a branch by just telling the cashier your account number and your password - no bank card required!

We've done a lot more, but that'll do for now!

I should add that it really helped us to be able to use Tim's sister's address and phone number for everything - it was like we had a "permanent" address immediately and were able to sign up for stuff straight away, then update our details later. If we didn't have her, I guess we'd have had to use the rented apartment address, but we would have had to explain to the owner, get access to the mailbox while we were there, then get him to forward things on once we left.

Also, I filled a decent-sized travel wallet with all of our important documents (passports, my COPR form, our marriage certificate etc) and took it out every time we went to do something else. It may have seemed like overkill, but there were some times that it helped to be able to just lay everything out on the desk. For example, rather than having to explain "okay, we applied for sponsorship when we were just living together but we've since got married so my surname has changed, my PR card hasn't arrived yet, my first names are too long for the space on the COPR" etc!