Sunday, 24 June 2007 by Val McDowall
Sunday, 24 June, 2007 - 6.00pm
I was in a panic. Where the heck were our medical papers? We were on the final straight, 2½ years of waiting to immigrate to Canada and I had the sinking feeling we were about to fall at the last hurdle. Tomorrow was our medicals in Glasgow. All I needed were the darned papers - I knew I'd left them right here in the kitchen -
We'd just returned from a week in Croatia and I'd left the papers right under the window in the usual spot. So where were they? My mind drifted back to the last minute housework we'd done on the morning of our flight and how my husband had been clearing up the kitchen -
During our holiday, I didn't even think about the paperwork - so assured was I that I'd left them out ready for our return. All I had to do was add our passports, birth certificates and the new passport photos.
That Sunday evening I'd planned to organize our documents and pack my overnight case. We'd decided to stay over in Glasgow after my hubby's medical and return the following afternoon for mine. Imagine my horror when I couldn't find a single trace of the paperwork we'd waited so long to receive -
Cue the frantic hours of searching, turning the house completely upside down and searching in all the ridiculous places you know full well you'd never put something but you're so desperate.
My brother was retuning our TV, ‘Why don't you go out for your tea like you'd planned? When you return you'll have a saner head on and will remember exactly where you put them.' I was close to hysteria by this stage.
The Crown Hotel in Kingskettle, is a fabulous Spanish restaurant. I had several glasses of wine, a fantastic meal and a liqueur coffee in an attempt to lift my sinking spirits - I knew in my heart the paperwork was gone.
On the morning that we'd flew to Croatia, my feckless husband decided to sort the rubbish for recycling. The collection was on Thursday and our friendly neighbour had offered to take our blue bin out and return it to the garden for us in our absence. Dougie remembers seeing the paperwork and says he put it to the side. We now both realise he's gotten his piles mixed up and dumped the whole lot in the blue bin.
We searched for a couple of hours more and gave up around midnight. Not surprisingly, neither of us slept well at all that night. We set the alarm so I could contact our emigration consultant in Holland at 7am our time (8am his), hoping that he was one of those continentals who went to work early. Dougie, feeling really guilty, got up at 5am and searched again bless him.
Next morning, an answering machine informed us that our consultant wouldn't be back into the office until Thursday. We had to leave at 11.30 to make sure we got through to Glasgow in plenty time for the x-rays.
At 8.30 I contacted the medical practice and explained what had happened. They called back at 10.30 asking me to print off Appendix D from the internet and bring it with us. Phew, we could still go ahead after all!
I spent 30 frantic minutes searching on-line for this form - everything else is available on the Canadian High Commission site apart from this blooming form and, of course, there's no-one to phone. I was suddenly reminded of why we chose to go with an emigration consultant in the first place!
Meanwhile, I'd contacted our consultant office in Edinburgh - no-one there who had any experience of emigration to Canada!
OK, so now I'm really beginning to sweat ...
Apparently, they have an attorney in Toronto but Canada is 7 hours behind us and they won't be in their office until our working day is over! Gulp!
Finally, I struck it lucky with Google and printed off Appendix D ... however, my euphoria was short lived.
At the medical practice we were informed that they'd had given us wrong information. They'd assumed for some reason that one of us was Canadian and the form they were talking about was only for that. Talk about disappointment.
By this time we'd had our x-rays and paid £150 each. I think our faces said it all. The medical practice staff were very helpful and sympathetic. One of the nurses said she had a contact at the High Commission and would find out what could be done.
In the end, it was left entirely at the discretion of the doctors who were to carry out the medicals but finally they agreed and also to hold on to the information while the High Commission re-issued the forms to us. We only really lost a week-ish in the end by the time I received and forwarded the re-issued forms - so not too bad at all.
I was worried it might've been a case of ‘no form - no medical' and we'd have to reschedule - we'd waited 6 weeks for the appointments and could've faced the same again if not longer for the next one. Good luck was definitely on our side or maybe it was because we looked so devastated!
A helping factor might have been the fact that Dougie thought he recognised the young doctor and the doctor him though they couldn't place each other until they were talking during the medical. Turns out twenty years ago the doctor, then aged 16 years old, had just left school and was working part-time at the same community use school as Dougie! They used to play squash together when everyone had gone home. He'd been working his way through college at the time - you've guessed it - to become a doctor! Talk about a small world! I'm not so sure we'd have been quite so fortunate had we been total strangers to him.
Relieved, we checked into an (unbeknown to us when we booked it) seedy hotel - a bit grubby round the edges but we were desperate and weary. The hotel was situated right on a busy motorway and with its single glazed windows, meant we spent our second night with very little sleep.
As I tried to settle down to sleep, I wondered (not for the first time) if we were ever going to get to Canada. It had been one hurdle after another. But here we are, one quick year later, living in Edmonton, Alberta with very fond memories of Scotland.
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