As the trials and tribulations of our immigration application take their course, lest not forget the small fact that my CF enrolment has been sitting on the back burner of late, waiting for me to near the end of my service. As august has now arrived, in accordance with the last email I received from CFRC, it was now time to give them a call to arrange my pre-enrolment medical, aptitude test and short interview.
I guess the way my luck’s been going lately I should have anticipated that things weren’t going to run smoothly. I duly made the call and my friendly recruiter promised me a response within a couple of days. Sure enough, all was silent so I rang again and was told again that an email with my flight details would arrive in ‘a couple of days’. Funnily enough, nothing arrived so I rang again and we engaged in a ‘candid’ discussion; a quick scan of his email in-box followed and I was finally given the disappointing news that ‘funding approval had not been given for my flights.’
It's amazing how much the fortunes of the CF have turned around in the last 12-months. When I was given my offer of employment I was advised that the CF would fly me out to do my enrolment tests and later they would move my family too once I'd enrolled. Unfortunately, full manning and good retention means us foreigners are no longer a desirable option (we cost too much) and I'm actually lucky I've still got an open job offer. The message that came back from my recruiter is that I'll be one of the last of the foreigners coming through for the foreseeable future. The upshot is there's no longer an offer to pay my travel costs to Canada and if I want to proceed with my enrolment I need to fund the travel myself. To be honest I look on this as a 'what you never had you never lost' situation and I am more than prepared to pay if it means that my enrolment goes through. At the end of the day it's a small price to pay up front for what could be a long term career with good prospects for me and my family.
Anyway, my flights are booked and I arrive in Toronto on 25th Oct. Hopefully it will be $650 well spent and I'll come away with the necessary ticks in the box. So far so good as they say; it's been a bit of a bumpy ride but we're getting there slowly but surely.
