the state of canadian accommodation is not strong
One of the things i find most detestable about both the US and Canada is that in countries with SO FUCKING MUCH empty space, accommodation is SO FUCKING EXPENSIVE. It's disgraceful. I have been desperately looking around for some way to live for cheap now that i am back in BC without a friend to couchsurf at, and it just doesn't exist.
Last year when i was cycling through the country i was able to find some cheap or even free places to pitch my tent, but they were very far out in the country - up to 50km from the nearest town. That is just about doable on a bike, but not viable when you are on foot. What is viable is walking about 10km with heavy gear to the sketchiest, sleaziest motels in town. And they will still cost you over $100 per night. Yes, the cheapest accomodation here in British Colombia is literally ten times the price of an equivalent accommodation in Actual Colombia. It is absolutely shameful.
Oh, you say, why don't you just get a short-term rental instead? Why indeed. Because those start at $2000 per month for a single room in a shared apartment. Plus cleaning/service fees. People are asking $1500 per month for an RV campsite. It's utterly out of control. And rich folks wonder why there are so many homeless people in BC. How many people can afford to spend $1500 per month on their accommodation expenses, and that's assuming they even own an RV in the first place? That's well over half of the Canadian minimum wage.
So i am basically burning my money here in Canada. I might as well just be lighting the inheritance i got from mom on fire, because i have zero income and the cash is just disappearing out in $500 chunks every time i find another 3 day stint at a motel (traveling between motels every few days to go from the cheapest one in town to the cheapest one in town). It's not any better in even more remote towns. You might get down to $89 a night if you are way out in the middle of nowhere. I mean... Fuck this. It's absurd. It's obnoxious.
And so i sit here, burning my mom's money, just waiting for my work permit to come through. As usual, immigration is a giant pain in the ass. Lots of bureaucracy. Lots of money. Lots of stress. Anybody who shits on immigrants is ignorant AF. Immigration is a spectacularly draining exercise. It is not for lazy people who want to find an easy way out.
The latest in the saga is that the Taiwanese labor authority wanted more documentation for my work permit, because my recent work experience was in China and because China is essentially in a cold war with Taiwan, neither country recognizes each other's paperwork unless it has been processed through the special anti-espionage check-and-double-check cross-strait bureau of mutual fuckery. Turns out it would be easier for me to quietly redact my Chinese work experience and file my documentation with proof of work in literally any other country of the world to help the work permit go through more quickly.
Of course, all this means there's been another delay of two weeks to get the work permit, which messes up all my subsequent plans. Specifically the July 7 appointment i had in Vancouver to get the work visa. You need to present the work permit to get the visa. And appointments in the Taiwanese embassy-but-we're-not-allowed-to-call-it-an-embassy must be booked 2-4 weeks in advance, during a very small window on the 1st or the 16th of the month. So if i miss this appointment, i need to book tomorrow during the very small window to reschedule into the July 16-31 block, and even then - assuming all my paperwork is accepted - i'll still be waiting 2 weeks for the actual visa.
And then when i get to Taiwan, i will need to go through mandatory COVID quarantine of 7 days. That's fair. But then i need to subsequently apply for an alien resident card, which is what you need to both open a bank account and to re-enter Taiwan as a foreigner after you entered it the first time on your visa. And that's important, because in the very first month of my job (theoretically but now unlikely to start August 1), i will be flying with the team to Switzerland for a departmental meeting. At this point it's almost looking like it would be easier to fly me to Switzerland from Canada and then continue to Taiwan after that. But that's a whole nother problem, because i need to physically be in Canada to get the visa, and they take your passport while you are waiting for the visa.
And through all of this process, i will be paying over $100 a night to stay in dingy motels. I will be out THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS before i even get to paying for the (thankfully reimbursed) flight that will take me to my new country and my new job. Being homeless is extremely fucking expensive and extremely difficult. I don't have a fixed address, so i am floating around the UPS store where i have a PO box that i paid for last year, because that's the only place where i can get snail mail. And pretty much everything to do with immigration requires not only a snail mail address, but also a legal residential address... Which of course i don't have - from the perspective of the government i am still living in the house that i moved out from last August, and which has subsequently been sold to a different owner entirely. But there is no facility anywhere for listing yourself as homeless. None of the systems allow you to do it. Not on your formal ID, not your bank, not your anything.
Oh, did i mention that i can't even get a new bank card? After spending 2 days visiting my actually-local-branch in Kamloops and calling up the national helpline, they said they simply cannot issue me a new card without sending it to my formal address, where i haven't lived in a year. And they can't send it to the branch or to a PO box because something something security bullshit. Oh, but if i was traveling overseas they could totally send it to the hotel i was staying at. It's such a fucking wank. Homeless people are 100% persona non grata in the system. Even when you're homeless and have six figures in an investment account.
Anyway, that is my rant of the day. I am still happy to be in Kamloops, which feels like home, despite me not having anywhere to live. I got my 4th COVID vaccination, which according to the Canadian government is just my 3rd because they don't recognize foreign vaccinations unless the paperwork has been translated by an approved translation service (yet another expensive "fuck you" to travelers/immigrants). But that's fine with me, i hope it will avoid me having any serious suffering over the next couple months when i'll be flying around to two more continents. I also met up with my old landlord L, we sat on the very-flooded riverbank and had some drinks and cigarettes and chatted about life. She's also coming home but homeless, because she's been living in Victoria over the past year after they sold the house. She's crashing on her sister's couch. Oh, and some good news - i went to the eye doctor to get my glasses tightened, and they said they'd be able to replace the whole kit and caboodle on warranty, because i have scratched lenses and a warped frame from the last year of traveling rough through tropical climates.
God, i do miss tropical climates. This summer is much less warm than last summer in BC, and the pissant 25 degrees with clouds and rain feels disappointingly chilly. Leave that shit on the island. Give me the 35 degree sun blast any day of the week. No, seriously, give it to me. I'm spending hundreds of dollars, it's the least you could do.
Ay la vida... Anyway, chin up, we battle on.
Last year when i was cycling through the country i was able to find some cheap or even free places to pitch my tent, but they were very far out in the country - up to 50km from the nearest town. That is just about doable on a bike, but not viable when you are on foot. What is viable is walking about 10km with heavy gear to the sketchiest, sleaziest motels in town. And they will still cost you over $100 per night. Yes, the cheapest accomodation here in British Colombia is literally ten times the price of an equivalent accommodation in Actual Colombia. It is absolutely shameful.
Oh, you say, why don't you just get a short-term rental instead? Why indeed. Because those start at $2000 per month for a single room in a shared apartment. Plus cleaning/service fees. People are asking $1500 per month for an RV campsite. It's utterly out of control. And rich folks wonder why there are so many homeless people in BC. How many people can afford to spend $1500 per month on their accommodation expenses, and that's assuming they even own an RV in the first place? That's well over half of the Canadian minimum wage.
So i am basically burning my money here in Canada. I might as well just be lighting the inheritance i got from mom on fire, because i have zero income and the cash is just disappearing out in $500 chunks every time i find another 3 day stint at a motel (traveling between motels every few days to go from the cheapest one in town to the cheapest one in town). It's not any better in even more remote towns. You might get down to $89 a night if you are way out in the middle of nowhere. I mean... Fuck this. It's absurd. It's obnoxious.
And so i sit here, burning my mom's money, just waiting for my work permit to come through. As usual, immigration is a giant pain in the ass. Lots of bureaucracy. Lots of money. Lots of stress. Anybody who shits on immigrants is ignorant AF. Immigration is a spectacularly draining exercise. It is not for lazy people who want to find an easy way out.
The latest in the saga is that the Taiwanese labor authority wanted more documentation for my work permit, because my recent work experience was in China and because China is essentially in a cold war with Taiwan, neither country recognizes each other's paperwork unless it has been processed through the special anti-espionage check-and-double-check cross-strait bureau of mutual fuckery. Turns out it would be easier for me to quietly redact my Chinese work experience and file my documentation with proof of work in literally any other country of the world to help the work permit go through more quickly.
Of course, all this means there's been another delay of two weeks to get the work permit, which messes up all my subsequent plans. Specifically the July 7 appointment i had in Vancouver to get the work visa. You need to present the work permit to get the visa. And appointments in the Taiwanese embassy-but-we're-not-allowed-to-call-it-an-embassy must be booked 2-4 weeks in advance, during a very small window on the 1st or the 16th of the month. So if i miss this appointment, i need to book tomorrow during the very small window to reschedule into the July 16-31 block, and even then - assuming all my paperwork is accepted - i'll still be waiting 2 weeks for the actual visa.
And then when i get to Taiwan, i will need to go through mandatory COVID quarantine of 7 days. That's fair. But then i need to subsequently apply for an alien resident card, which is what you need to both open a bank account and to re-enter Taiwan as a foreigner after you entered it the first time on your visa. And that's important, because in the very first month of my job (theoretically but now unlikely to start August 1), i will be flying with the team to Switzerland for a departmental meeting. At this point it's almost looking like it would be easier to fly me to Switzerland from Canada and then continue to Taiwan after that. But that's a whole nother problem, because i need to physically be in Canada to get the visa, and they take your passport while you are waiting for the visa.
And through all of this process, i will be paying over $100 a night to stay in dingy motels. I will be out THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS before i even get to paying for the (thankfully reimbursed) flight that will take me to my new country and my new job. Being homeless is extremely fucking expensive and extremely difficult. I don't have a fixed address, so i am floating around the UPS store where i have a PO box that i paid for last year, because that's the only place where i can get snail mail. And pretty much everything to do with immigration requires not only a snail mail address, but also a legal residential address... Which of course i don't have - from the perspective of the government i am still living in the house that i moved out from last August, and which has subsequently been sold to a different owner entirely. But there is no facility anywhere for listing yourself as homeless. None of the systems allow you to do it. Not on your formal ID, not your bank, not your anything.
Oh, did i mention that i can't even get a new bank card? After spending 2 days visiting my actually-local-branch in Kamloops and calling up the national helpline, they said they simply cannot issue me a new card without sending it to my formal address, where i haven't lived in a year. And they can't send it to the branch or to a PO box because something something security bullshit. Oh, but if i was traveling overseas they could totally send it to the hotel i was staying at. It's such a fucking wank. Homeless people are 100% persona non grata in the system. Even when you're homeless and have six figures in an investment account.
Anyway, that is my rant of the day. I am still happy to be in Kamloops, which feels like home, despite me not having anywhere to live. I got my 4th COVID vaccination, which according to the Canadian government is just my 3rd because they don't recognize foreign vaccinations unless the paperwork has been translated by an approved translation service (yet another expensive "fuck you" to travelers/immigrants). But that's fine with me, i hope it will avoid me having any serious suffering over the next couple months when i'll be flying around to two more continents. I also met up with my old landlord L, we sat on the very-flooded riverbank and had some drinks and cigarettes and chatted about life. She's also coming home but homeless, because she's been living in Victoria over the past year after they sold the house. She's crashing on her sister's couch. Oh, and some good news - i went to the eye doctor to get my glasses tightened, and they said they'd be able to replace the whole kit and caboodle on warranty, because i have scratched lenses and a warped frame from the last year of traveling rough through tropical climates.
God, i do miss tropical climates. This summer is much less warm than last summer in BC, and the pissant 25 degrees with clouds and rain feels disappointingly chilly. Leave that shit on the island. Give me the 35 degree sun blast any day of the week. No, seriously, give it to me. I'm spending hundreds of dollars, it's the least you could do.
Ay la vida... Anyway, chin up, we battle on.