₦airaland Forum

KRTL:
.

You don't get child care benefits until you have lived for 18months if you are an international student.

All other things apply. But i honestly do not know how you intend to combine studies, payment of fees, child care for the 2 year old while you are in school especially when you are the only one here. Maybe for the 5 year old i can understand. But the 2 year old? Hmm. Guess you would have funds coming in from Naija.

You know your circumstances, so you are a better judge of your situation. I would rather drop the 2 year old till much later maybe after 3 months when you have settled in well. Except you have a family friend you would be staying with here that would help you with the burden in the first few months. You should also check around your school to see what facilities they offer for mothers. Also start looking for child care centers around the school area and start sending emails and enquiries . Not impossible to do but it would be hell of an effort if you pulled this off.

Creativebelle:
Wow wow..this is an eye opener..thanks for this..Housing tho..God will help us ooo lol..
Some mothers are going alone with the kids..God will see everyone through.. thank you

The lord is your strength. How old are these kids?

Creativebelle:
We know ..we need it for the journey cos we got kids..hyperactive kids that will probably drain our phone batteries..lol

You actually need it.. especially if you never buy car... I dey carry my power bank steady. You don't want a flat battery when google maps is your only way home.

I suffered the day my battery went dead. Had to go into a chinese cafe and beg the attendant to help charge for some few minutes to get details of my connecting buses and my way home

All these bring iru bring garri no be the koko.

Would share some bit of not personal and personal experience.

1. Budget well for housing. Houses are fucking expensive for families. As a single person you can pair up and share bunks and pay $800 but with a family? You need a proper house. A single 1 bedroom goes for at least $1800 CAD in Ontario and British Columbia.

You might be lucky to get something cheaper in Alberta or Winnipeg but even there you would have to budget at least $1300 per month. Also note that Landlords won't just rent you anything anyhow. If you are a family of four. Minimum you can take is a 2 bedroom. Also if the kids are teenagers of different sexes please note you might be required to get individual rooms for them .so factor all these in your budget . Housing is one of the biggest headache. With what the Landlords went through during the pandemic. A lot are asking for minimum 4 months or even 6months rent. It can be worse if you landed and have no job or credit history with kids. Omoh. You go hear am. More reason sometimes it is better for one of the primary applicant land first and see what's happening before you bundle the battalions down. You don't want to spending your Nigerian earned naira
money here. I can guarantee you, two months and your mutli year savings from Nigeria is gone.


2. For parents with kids who are much younger and need a minder, nanny, daycare or what not. Getting placement in daycares is a fucking nightmare. Some daycares have waiting list of 100 families. Heck even oyinbo people here start joining the wait list for daycares once they are pregnant. So they can get ahead and get a placement immediately they give birth and start daycare once they are ready to return back to work. Same applies to to elementary schools . You have to apply for placement.

Fees for daycare is like $35 per day in most provinces. Your province might provide subsidies if both parents are working.

When you land. To cut your spendings and not pay for daycare at least for a start or pending when you find a placement. Parents might need to alternate their working hours. Maybe wife works nights, husband mornings so someone is always home. Or for those guys wey no sabi look after kids(sorry is your case) . You might need to take up two jobs because sadly a single income cannot cater for the needs of most families here after dem knack you taxes , EI, CPP.

3. Government offers child care grants per child. You might receive as much as $700 monthly per child depending on Province. You need to file this immediately you land and have all the documents required. Takes about 6weeks for the Canadian Revenue Agency to get back to you with a cheque. The amount would reduce depending on your income the next time they compute your yearly taxes.


4. Toddler foods can be a problem. All those Nutribon, Golden Moore no dey here and kids might really not like the substitutes around. Also buying from African stores is expensive. N1600 Golden moore 800g goes for like $24. That's about 12k and would advise you pack plenty of these when coming if you have toddlers.

5.. There are always parks and playgrounds around most areas but need adult supervision. Kids do well with the cold, but I would advise you pack along drugs for kids. Heck there is a crises were Tylenol for kids (paracetamol) and Advil(pain relief, cold, catarrh drugs) are almost not on any shelves in Canada. There's scarcity. So pack Cough syrup, kids paracetamol plenty. Infact if you can pack 5carton.. carry am.


6. What else am I missing? RESP? That's too complex to talk about here. You would get an handle once you land and start earning. It's a targetted education savings plans towards your kids colleges. Elementary and high school is free in public institutions but colleges and universities are fucking expensive. So parents open interest free savings accounts for each kids and government might even match a certain level of amount towards paying for your kids university education. See below link for a summary.

https://www.sunlife.ca/en/offer/resp/?WT.mc_id=en-ca:sem:paid:Google:national:X%7cSLF_NAT%7cPGS%7cGNR%7cEX%7cEN%7cCA%7cX%7cAways-On%7cX%7cX%7cGeneric_Product_Investment:resp&WT.srch=1&ef_id=Cj0KCQiAgribBhDkARIsAASA5bsWKUMn8bfVlSOz8TFO4-LablBLb0oZhk-mkrxnZTgGI_c5_0u8jJUaAg_5EALw_wcB:G:s&s_kwcid=AL!13660!3!476093472664!e!!g!!resp&gclid=Cj0KCQiAgribBhDkARIsAASA5bsWKUMn8bfVlSOz8TFO4-LablBLb0oZhk-mkrxnZTgGI_c5_0u8jJUaAg_5EALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds


7. Apply for as much benefits as you can get please. Don't bleed the society but if you are struggling. Ask for help. There are always government programs out there to help especially for families with kids.

8. Lastly don't paint Nigeria as a bad country to your kids. Let them learn the good values the country teaches. Small time i have spent in parks. The kids can swear for Africa and it is almost all of them. We get bad kids for naija, but for the posh area I stay . I expected better language and manners. Also social vices are very rife. Smoking , drugs, partying amongst teenagers and whatnot. Omoh the amount of cigarettes butts i saw in the span of 1 week i didn't see it in my 30 plus years staying in the most ghettoish parts of most Nigerian cities. So you need to wear that toga of an African parent and try as much as possible to be friends with your kids so they can tell you everything that goes on in their lives. Especially the teenagers.

Let them learn their local languages. Speak it with them. A lot of kids of immigrants lose their identities and end up depressed abi confused because they are caught up in two different worlds. One where the customs of their parents is different from where they now call home; whilst where they call home might not be as accepting of them as the "natural born" kids here. I see a lot and I am speaking from experience. The kids i have seen that are well adjusted are ones where their Nigerian roots seem a lot intact. Caveat not saying others aren't. But it's hsrd when a child tries to assimilate a culture that's different and can't draw inspiration from their closest loved ones but strangers.

The most traumatic time of my life was when we moved to a different region in Nigeria when i was in Primary 6. I was the only different kid who couldn't speak the local language well. I had a different accent. And it was hell making friends. The kids gave me names and i only had one or two friends. I dreaded going to school because i was just different. Now imagine the scales of differences here and the challenges your kid MIGHT likely face? They might be the only black kids in their entire class or even school if you move into more remote areas. So you need to be closer to them and support them. This is where fathers also need to play active roles. Takes a lot of parenting to support kids moving to a new society to settle in well. On the face value you might think they are settled but some deep structural issues don't crop up until later in life. So please be listening, engaging and support them.


I hope i tried a bit.. I don't have it all figured out yet. But we learn as we go.