Hiya,
Depressed southern neighbor here looking for some advice. I'm sure you can guess where I'm going with this, so let's not mince words: what's some advice on getting to the Vancouver area, obtaining a visa, and a job, etc.? I'm not really looking for nitty gritty details on legal processes and what not, I can find that info documented in various places online (unless you just have a really good link chocked full of info for me). I'm more so looking for some insight from the denizens of the area that know it well.
I'm a millenial that's been in tech my whole life. I know it's a massive field, but because I've been on linux terminals since I was a wee lad I know how to do... well almost everything that has a job title for it and even at an older age I can pickup new languages and systems with relative ease. Besides that, I'm also an electrician, mechanic, and musician. I've been loosely looking for jobs, but so far what I've seen seems to be in the city and I need to refine my search. I generally prefer to be closer to the forest, or the mountains (glacier snowboarding is on my bucket list, before they all melt), but I wouldn't turn down the city if it came down to that.
What are some not-so-populated areas of the west coast that still have at least a semblance of infrastructure? I don't really care about nightlife, I just want to do tech things and mind my own business without everything that's happening around me right now (I'm currently in the epicenter of the southern maga dipshits).
I'm curious, too... what's the temperature like as far as Canadians accepting educated, healthy, non-fascist US citizens? In other words, do you think there might be some bias against me just because of where I currently reside? Take note how I don't call myself American, because my ancestry is not indigenous to this land. I just happened to be born here.
Any advice on places to checkout/avoid, companies to checkout/avoid, etc. would be awesome and I appreciate it.
And just in case it's a requirement, you should also know that I put a spoonful of Maple Syrup in my coffee every morning, nothing else. It's a magical thing! Started doing that many moons ago and I'll never take coffee any other way now.
ETA: After a couple of comments and staring at the map, I probably should have said British Columbia rather than specifying Vancouver, that's my bad. Seems to me like the remote areas up there may be more my speed.
I live in Alberta so I can’t say much on the front of where to live.
When a lot of Canadians say they hate the US (including myself) we are more so saying that we hate the government, not everyone living there. I fully welcome any Americans who want to come to Canada with open arms to escape what is going on down south and I highly doubt you will face much bias being from the US.
As for businesses, I have started to use co-op a lot more especially for gas. I don’t know how many there are in BC, but we have them everywhere here in Alberta. It’s a Canadian co-operative association and you can get a membership to your local co-op for $5 CAD (it isn’t required to shop there but you do get equity and money back on every purchase you make)
I'm just so used to how the southern confederates act towards things like this. They'll vilify an entire country like China, and then practically tar and feather any Korean that walks by because of it. Crazy shit.
Are you speaking of this? https://canada.coop/en/
Looks like they have stuff pretty much all over CA, and even possibly some jobs to look into as well. Thanks for that tip! Co-ops are something I really miss about the western states. They're practically illegal on the east.
I was specifically talking about https://co-op.crs/, a chain of cooperative grocery stores and gas stations through western Canada. However, that seems to be a good list of other coops worth taking a look at!