Q: i am currently living in edmonton alberta and am planning on movong to vancouver. i plan on gettting a cooking job untill i can go back to my normal job. all i know is that i am going to get a enough money for two months rent and that should give me time to find a job... i dont have much stuff to move i can take all of it on a plane. is there anything else i should do or know about moving to vancouver?
A: 1. Steer clear of Surrey unless you like constant break-ins and a report in the news every week or every other week about some gang-style hit that happened in your neighborhood. 2. Steer clear of Richmond unless you're Asian or can read Mandarin/Cantonese. Nothing against Asians but if you're Caucasian you will probably feel like you're on a different continent. 3. Never loose sight of the fact that "BC" stands for "Bring Cash". 4. If you're not bringing a car, try to find a place that is really convenient to transit and preferably skytrain... the buses here are useless because they get stuck in traffic just like everyone else. 5. As long as you're okay with spending a minimum of $900 a month on a crappy entry-level apartment or tiny basement suite with ceilings that are so low you have to duck your head everywhere there is a support beam for the floors above you, then you're good to go. 6. If it was easy to make the move here, hundreds of thousands more would be doing it. In other words, its not going to be a piece of cake to set up a new life here. 1 in 10 Canadians (Ipsos-Reid Poll) say the would love to live in Vancouver if only they could afford it. #1 reason why people who live here move away? The rainy weather for 8 months of the year. 7. People here are very stand-off'ish compared to practically everywhere else. There's like a certain egotistical attitude to everyone like they're too good for someone who just moved here. Be prepared for tight-knit cliques and many lonely nights until you can get used to the idea of having to "date" your friends--even guy to guy. It can take months for even co-workers to warm up to the idea of doing something outside of work with you. 8. Never loose sight of the fact that "BC" means "Bring Cash". You'll need plenty of it. Even groceries cost more here. A box of cereal is around $6.50 to $8. A loaf of bread is $3.75. And don't ever forget that as an Albertan, you've been used to a life without provincial sales tax. In Vancouver there's an extra 7% tax on everything you buy including cars. Total sales tax: 12%. Liquor tax is another 18%. 9. If you're bringing a car with you, be prepared for about a week's worth of run-a-rounds to collect all the paper work from various agencies and inspection shops scattered all over town before you will be eligible to sign up for the most expensive insurance you've ever paid for a car in your life. ...and you won't have a choice. Even with my 43% safe driver's deduction after having no claims or accidents for 10 years, I still pay $1,376 a year for insurance on a truck that is barely worth $1,000 and I don't have any choice in the matter. There's only one insurance company and its the government run Insurance Corp. of BC. They're a monopoly and they know it. 10. Be prepared to see this place double in size in the next 30 years and double again in probably another 30. Experts are already saying Vancouver will eventually grow to about 10 million people before it can no longer sustain itself.