'I had to start from zero:' Rebuilding networks a difficult reality for Windsor immigrants
CBC
Halfway to Home: Immigration Stories, a five-part series, began April 24 on Windsor Morning. Tune in on our CBC Listen app or live at 97.5 FM. We'll also be at the Budimir branch of the Windsor Public Library on Saturday for the event Creating Space.
Who could forget the guy with the ascot tie?
That's what Willys Abali told himself as he put on the wide, formal necktie before heading out to a University of Windsor open house. And again before heading to a job fair — and to many events after that.
Before then, Abali — a Nigerian immigrant who arrived in Windsor as an international student — had thought a Canadian education would be his ticket to a great engineering career.
But as graduation approached, he could see he needed something else: connections.
"I realized, I don't know anybody who I could reach out to, to say: 'Do you know someone who knows someone who knows someone?'" he said. "I had no network."
In episode four of Halfway to Home, series creator Aman Ghawanmeh spoke to Abali, who arrived to Windsor 2005, and Helena Palma-Kurek, an accountant who arrived from Peru the same year, to be with her husband who lived here.
Halfway to Home highlights the experiences of immigrants in Windsor-Essex. About one in five people living in the region arrived as newcomers, which means it has the 11th largest immigrant population in the country, according to Statistics Canada.
During a conversation at Windsor Public Library's Budimir Branch, Abali and Palma-Kurek shared their own network-building stories, recalled early attempts to make themselves "memorable," and offered tips for newcomers.
WATCH | Aman Ghawanmeh, Helena Palma-Kurek and Willys Abali talk about networking:
When it came to finding a job in finance, Palma-Kurek realized quickly that her accounting experience and skills were not enough in Canada. She didn't know anyone who could put in a good word for her, or even point her to work in her field.
Her husband is a Polish immigrant who had a small friend group at the time, and neither he, nor Palma-Kurek, had family in Windsor.
"I was on my own," she said. "What I realized was that I had to start from zero."
It wasn't easy. She had been so confident when she arrived in Canada. She knew she was capable — good at her profession. But in the months that followed, she started to lose hope.
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