It was October 1998 after 10 years of fierce civil war in El Salvador the government and the guerrilla were giving their best shots to win, but in this scenario there are no winners but pain, sorrow, hate you name it, all kind of sour feeling but love.

The government forces were looking for me under the belief that I was cooperating with the guerrilla force, if they catch me, most likely they would kill me, for that reason in a very quick move my father drove my wife and I to Honduras with the plan that from there we will fly to Canada. Without my wife, and I having the opportunity to say goodbye to the rest of the family and without knowing that even us would be able to make even to Honduras.

I didn't mention the details of how we made it to Honduras but finally we did. Once there, my father accompanied us to buy the tickets to Montreal city in Quebec, which at that time was not too much problems to buy flights to Canada since it was known that Canada is accepting refugees from El Salvador and all Central America where there were political persecution.

Next day my father drove us to the international airport in Tegucigalpa, Honduras capital and before getting in the airplane we hugged our father knowing that it might be the last hug, we cried and he said "Be brave if God wants, we will see each other next time” and we told him "Please give our regards to the rest of the family. One chapter in our life has ended right there by leaving Central America we never thought that we're basically leaving behind the best years of our life. I was 36 years old then and my wife 26.

October 28, 1998 after ten hours of flight, we arrived to the Dorval airport in Montreal city, my wife and I thought we spoke enough English to get around being able to make the transition easy but that was not the case. Our English skill was very poor and besides that, in Montreal, French is the main language.

We were interviewed for the immigration having to answer all kinds of questions and filling in all the forms to be at least let in to Canada. Finally, they found reasonable explanations and they let us come into Montreal city by ourselves. When the new arrival brings some money, this money has to be spent before any kind of social assistance is given. It was10:00 PM, we had a friend who was willing to host us for some time but we did not know where he lived so we just had his phone #, we called him and he said it is too late to find a place to sleep in Montreal and in the morning he will pick us up.

We decided to take a taxi from the airport to Montreal; it was very cold we were wearing summer light clothing. Luckily, there was one taxi waiting at the station and we tried to speak in English to him and he replied in French and finally he talked to us in broken Spanish. He was a Black fellow from Haiti. He took us to the hotel in Montreal downtown and we paid in USD and he did not give us any exchange for the rate difference. He went with us to the hotel and the same happens we paid with USD and years later, we found out that the invoice said Can

adian dollars. Anyway, the following day our friend met us at the hotel and we rode the underground (metro) train to North Montreal were he kindly prepared a place for us temporarily, with the agreement to pay him when we star to work. It was winter time and my friend told me to buy winter shoes and because of lack of money, I bought the cheapest ones, then the first snow storm fell. Because I didn't know how to walk on the snow when I went out for the first time to buy groceries I fell down and at least 10 times in a distance of a block I was ashamed because I tried to stand up and I end up on the ground again I think right there I damaged some ligaments of my right hip (in which still giving me problems up to now).

By Christmas time, I fell down so badly that I broke the small finger from my left hand and I hit my face on the ground so bad that I almost lost my left eye. Finally by the end of my first winter I managed to walk slowly not falling down when snow was on the ground. After winter time was over Immigration Office granted me permit to work, and I stared looking for work, I am an accountant, my wife a technician in agriculture but we did not speak English neither French, we ended up taking any opportunity available. My wife found a job as a general laborer and I found job as carpenter helper, even I didn't know much of carpentry. For 6 years I kept working as laborer on Montreal and attending school at night time to learn French, my wife after one year, did not attend school any more because especially on winter time, it is very hard after coming from work going out again to school.

Then after six years we were accepted as landed immigrants. That's when we decided to move to Vancouver, British Columbia because we couldn't get used to those heavy winters in Montreal. Then we have to start all over again the only difference this time is that we were not leaving any family behind.

Finally after 17 years of a lot challenges, God bless us with a beautiful daughter that at the present is six years old and we have been able to buy our own first home and I am working in what I know to do accounting, for that reason I don't stop praising Jesus Christ the Son of God because without his holy spirit accompanying us we would not be able to accomplish any thing.

 Previous      Next