I have 5 more days to go before I start work (I’ll be sharing my experience in another post) and with a lot of things to share, I am using whatever free time I have left to write.
April 17, 2016 is our flight date, we’re flying with Philippine Airlines bound for Toronto with a technical stopover in Vancouver. We stayed in a hotel near the airport for easy and hassle free ride to the airport. But yeah, hassle happens.
Our flight tickets indicate that our departure port is at the Main Terminal and all along we assumed that it is NAIA Terminal 1. After saying our goodbyes to our family, we rode an Uber to the “Main Terminal” 4.5 hours before the flight. Since we have a lot of time, we tried to relax and enjoy our last few hours in Manila.
We are about to enter Terminal 1 when the guard who asked for our tickets told us that we are at the wrong terminal and that we are supposed to be in Terminal 2. After I did some verifications (through the information section and of course the internet), we are indeed leaving through Terminal 2 (PAL’s Main Terminal). With 3 hours to go, we arrived at Terminal 2.
Unfortunately, there were many passengers at that time and we have to queue for 30 minutes just to enter the terminal. Here you’ll see people bribing airport employees just so they can enter the terminal instantly. This is one of the reasons why you’ll want to leave the Philippines.
We are supposed to do a web check-in and since PAL’s online applications are so reliable, we were not able do a web check-in and have to do it the old fashion way. After another 45 minutes, we were able to secure our boarding passes. Note that you need to pay travel taxes for all the people who will be travelling with you. You can look up the rates here http://tieza.gov.ph/travel-tax/. We paid a total of PHP 4250 for two adults and one minor.
After securing our boarding passes, we went to the immigration officer. Here, they will ask for your passports. You have to tell them that you will be migrating. They will then validate your PDOS sticker, your visa, as well as your passport details. It usually takes around 5 minutes if there’s no problem. After an agonising 3.5 hours we arrived at our gate. We boarded at round 3PM and due to some circumstances, we flew at around 430PM (1.5 hours delayed).
The seats that were provided to us were very comfortable with excellent leg room. We were transferred to a better Choice Seat. This is our first long haul flight and it was a good experience (at least the inflight experience with PAL is good). We arrived in Vancouver after 12 hours. Some passengers alighted here while Toronto-bound passengers stayed on the plane. After an hour, the plane continued its flight to Toronto for another 4.5 hours. We arrived at around 9PM Toronto time, 25 minutes earlier than the estimated arrival.
Be sure to fill-out the arrival card (one per family, be sure to declare monetary instruments that are more than CAD 10,000) provided by the flight attendants that will be presented to the Canadian immigration officer. After presenting your passports to the immigration officer, they will ask you to queue to another room where they process new residents. Here, you will present your Certificate of Permanent Residency (COPR), passports and other documents for after around 45 minutes. Then, they will welcome you to Canada and will tell you that your PR Card will be sent to your indicated address in 4-6 weeks. They will also give you an instruction sheet on how to update your address if ever you will be changing your address.
You will now collect your luggages and will proceed to customs. Here you will declare monetary instruments exceeding CAD 10,000 and if the customs officer deemed necessary, a detailed list of all belonging accompanying you and those that are to follow. The officer only asked for the E677 – CROSS-BORDER CURRENCY OR MONETARY INSTRUMENTS REPORT form and after that, we were able to exit the airport. We were welcomed by my cousin and a brother in The Feast.
It has been a week and three days since we’ve arrived and we are still adjusting to the time difference and of course, the cold weather. This post ends this section. I’ll be starting a new section soon where I will share all our experiences here as new permanent residents. Until next post.
New Tatay Adventures 
Really happy to have found this blog as it proves that it is possible to successfully migrate to Canada. 🙂
My wife and I are still in the waiting stage for our ITAs at this point and while our Express Entry points aren’t as high as yours (we’re at 440), we’re hopeful that the point requirements go down soon or that the Provincial Nomination we applied to pans out.
I’ve enjoyed reading your posts and would just like to thank you for sharing these details since they will surely be helpful to many people.
Good luck! 🙂
Thank you. I’m glad that I’m able to help people through these posts. As per your analysis, a sizeable chunk of applicants are in the 400-450 range so it’ll be really hard for the scores to go down below 450 but we’ll never know. Let’s pray for your provincial nomination to be successful. You can also try applying for a job in Canada from the Philippines. I’ll be sharing my experience in my next post.
If I can help you with anything, do let me know. I can give you my email address if you want. Good luck and God bless you.
I’m scheduled to migrate soon and have been following your blog. Really helpful. Keep your updates coming ☺️👍🏼
Thank you. 🙂 That’s good news. Welcome to Canada in advance. God bless.
Hi,
I will be migrating soon with my 1 year old daughter, do you have any packing, flight tips/advice?
Thanks.
Hi Maplesyrup,
First things first, if you have extra bucks, try to select seats with a better leg room and where bassinet will fit, usually the first row. Note though that this comes with a fee. You can check seatguru.com for this one. If you’re travelling on a business class, then there’s no problem here. 🙂
If you weren’t or won’t be able to select a seat in the plane, try to check in early. You can ask the one in the check-in counter if she can give you a better seat since you have a child with you and if possible a bassinet to come along with it.
For packing tips, my wife will be the best person to ask. Haha. But be aware of the baggage limit per passenger. Usually it’s just 2, 23 kg baggage plus 7kg carry-on luggage each (the baby is also given 7kg carry-on luggage in PAL). The bottom line is just bring the essentials. Be sure to put in your passports, COPRs and CAD cash in your hand-carry since you won’t have access to your luggage during the immigration process. Also, don’t forget to put your baby’s diaper, milk, extta set of clothes, wet wipes, snacks and at least of your baby’s toys in your carry-on.
My wife breastfed my daughter during take-off and landing to help her with the sudden change of pressure. If your baby doesn’t breast feed anymore, try to make her suck her pacifier during take-off and landing.
It’s a chilly here so if you can squeeze in your jackets in your carry-on that will be great.
I hope I was able to help you. Welcome to Canada in advance and God bless.
Salamat! 🙂 Will follow your advice.. 🙂 god bless
Hi,
Your blog is inspiring and motivating us to push more with our Canadian dream.
You mentioned in your comment to apply to Canadian companies while still here in the Philippines. Can you suggest link or websites where we can look for jobs? Can we do this even if we are still in the process of waiting to be nominated? Thank you!
You can definitely try and apply but being hired is another hurdle you need to overcome. It’s hard to get LMIA for foreign workers unless your skills are rare. I used job bank, monster.ca, workpolis and LinkedIn. You can also search the jobs/careers section of the companies that you are targeting (that’s how I got my job).
God bless to you and your family and good luck.