Settling in Canada and navigating a new life

I arrived in Canada on 9 September 2003, with several other SRP students. When I came out of customs, several students from different universities in Ontario were at Toronto Pearson International Airport to receive us. Several groups of people were standing with posters displaying the names of their students, while others held balloons with “Welcome to Canada” written on them. I was received by a LC at Victoria College, and a Sudanese WUSC student from Kakuma refugee camp who had arrived the year before me.

When we got to Victoria College, they showed me my room. The WUSC local committee had arranged for me to stay in one of the student accommodation houses on campus. I lived in a single bedroom in the Upper Burwash Residence in North House. North House was mostly occupied by first-year students and was overseen by a don, an upper-year student. After I was shown my room, the don gave me an orientation regarding the routines that house members followed and the shared space. We shared a kitchenette, a small eating area, and a common area with cable TV, toilets, and a bathroom.

I received a lot of support during the first few weeks and the first year I was in Canada. For the first few weeks, the local WUSC volunteers took turns taking me to the dining hall or showing me around the campus. There was a lot to get used to. Navigating financial tasks was a priority. College campus student coordinators helped me with setting up a bank account, budgeting, grocery shopping, applying for financial assistance from the university, and organising alternative accommodation while the university was closed. Communication was next; even though I had good English proficiency, I found that Canadians speak fast (and they thought the same about me), so we often had to ask each other to slow down in order to understand each other. Eventually, I became accustomed to the speed at which Canadians spoke, and vice versa, but taking the time to get used to the way Canadians spoke helped me to settle in and integrate into university life. I purposefully interacted with students and friends from Canada and other countries to improve my communication, despite the comfort of spending time with other Sudanese students at UofT.

Members of the LC took me out to explore Toronto in the early days; we went on the Sky Ride in Toronto, and we watched a baseball game between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Cleveland Guardians (formerly called the Cleveland Indians). While I enjoyed the excitement around me and the popcorn, I didn’t understand anything about baseball at the time other than seeing grown-up men hitting a ball and running to the next base, while the other side tried to catch the ball and throw it back to the base. It was a classic “Welcome to Canada” moment for me.

Apart from taking me around the campus and the city, the WUSC LC also supported me three months after our arrival in Canada to attend the WUSC general conference in Ottawa in November 2003, which is held once a year. The conference attracted advocates, scholars, human rights lawyers, humanitarian workers, and WUSC alumni to share their knowledge, views, and experiences on refugee education. During that conference, I met several other WUSC students with whom I had travelled to Canada. It allowed me to re-establish contact with some WUSC students I knew from the Kakuma refugee camp who were from other universities, which was vital to feeling a sense of social network and support, albeit remotely.

In the year that I was supported by Victoria College, I had full access to the student dining hall. There was breakfast, lunch, and dinner. There was so much food that I couldn’t eat all my planned meals. I wasn’t used to eating three times a day, as I ate once a day in the refugee camp. Therefore, although the LC bought me full meal plans (breakfast, lunch, and dinner), I ate only twice daily, either breakfast and lunch, lunch and dinner or breakfast and dinner. I was concerned about my inability to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner, so I donated my meals to “Students Against Hunger” at Victoria College, which was an initiative run by students at the time to help save food from going to waste by donating it to homeless shelters. We developed a signup sheet for students to donate their food if they felt they couldn’t eat their planned meals. We had students donating their breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The management at the dining hall was very supportive of the idea, and they saved the donated food. After all the students had eaten, the donated foods and whatever foods were left were delivered to a Homeless Shelter. I was actively involved in this program until I moved out of my residence after my first year.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time living in North House in the Upper Burwash Residence. I was pleased to meet many friendly and helpful students who made me feel truly welcome. The common area was a great place to connect with other students in the residence, and I used it frequently, especially during the first few days when I was feeling a bit lonely. The location of the accommodation was ideal for me, as it was close to all the amenities I needed. It saved me money on transportation to and from the university, and I could study in the library for as long as I needed without worrying about catching the last bus home.

The only drawback of living on campus was that the residence was closed during the holidays, and students returned home. I had nowhere to go back to when the residence closed during the school holidays, making it challenging for the local WUSC committees to find me alternative accommodation. One LC member and his family were kind enough to accommodate me during the holidays at their home in Kincardine, which was about 222 kilometres west of Toronto and was located by the beautiful coast of Lake Huron. It took over three hours to drive from Toronto to their home, mostly driven by his father.

I was given another place to stay when North House closed, such as another student accommodation building, Rowell Jackman Hall, at Victoria College during one of the holidays. But the same LC member and his parents hosted me at their home again. His parents became like godparents to me, providing advice, guidance, and food throughout my time at the University of Toronto and they hosted me at their home many other times. On those occasions, his mom used to take me for walks along Lake Huron’s beach every morning. During these walks, she shared stories about her husband’s initial struggles when he arrived in Canada as a migrant in the 1960s. She emphasised that even though life was difficult, her husband persevered and eventually became a successful engineer, taking a senior leadership role after working at the local nuclear power plant for over 30 years. Her words gave me hope and motivation that I, too, could complete my education and find employment if I worked hard. Both were present at my graduation, and they generously organised and paid for a graduation dinner for me. We have kept in touch ever since and have shared Christmas and Diwali wishes every year for the last 20 years.

A memorable winter experience in Canada

This section discusses my new experience of the changing seasons and the transition to winter in Canada as a WUSC student. The section narrates how I prepared for the cold weather, my first encounter with snow, and the festivities and activities I experienced during the winter. I also share observations of how Christmas is celebrated in Canada compared to my home village.

I arrived in Canada in September, a time of year when the grass and trees were still green. However, not long after I arrived, I started seeing the leaves turn golden into beautiful leaves. And soon, they started to fall off, and all the trees became bare, with no leaves left on them. The days became shorter, with the sun setting earlier than usual. I was told winter was coming, and that I needed to prepare to live through the cold winter weather. This included acquiring things I had never had to think about before: warm clothing, shoes, mittens, toques (commonly known in Australia as beanies), scarves; people even changed their car tyres, bought shovels to clear their driveways, and stocked up for emergency winter storms.

Through talking to other students, I learnt that listening to weather forecasts was important whenever I planned to go out. I didn’t have a television in my room then, so I was worried about the weather catching me off guard without being properly prepared for it. Luckily, the LC had bought me a small alarm radio which I kept by my bedside, and I learnt to tune the radio into the local weather stations every morning at 6 am.

I was also worried about winter partly because of what I had been taught about Canada in high school. While studying for my O-Level in Uganda, we were taught that the people of Canada built igloos and went ice fishing during the winter. My worry was exacerbated by my understanding of ice; in my village, the only ice we knew came from hailstones during rainstorms, which significantly destroyed crops and livestock that were vital to the community’s survival. Crops, such as fruits, vegetables, and grains were often severely battered, leading to substantial crop losses. The aftermath was often accompanied by severe famine due to the destruction of crops, so you can understand my fear of ice.

One early Tuesday morning –25 November 2003 – I was startled to see a white, powdery, ash-like substance covering the grounds and plants outside my room window. It was my first encounter with snow. Probably sensing that I would be confused, a LC member called and advised me to dress warmly if I planned to go out. I could almost feel the chill as I peered through my room window. Then, it began to snow again. I pulled my study chair closer to the window and watched the fluffy snowfall, amazed at its softness. It was a far cry from the hard, icy image that had been lurking in my mind and causing anxiety.

Even though the LC had helped me buy a jacket, mitten, toque, scarf, and winter boots to prepare for the winter, I was unsure how to dress appropriately, given that it was my first snow. I watched through my room window to see how other people dressed. But like the leaves on the trees, the once bustling streets became bare, with only those who truly needed to be going out. And confusingly, while some of them seemed to dress warmly, others only wore a sweater, and one even wore thongs. I was unsure if mimicking others’ dress was a good idea, as they might be accustomed to the weather. I was worried about cold burns, a condition where the skin is damaged due to exposure to extreme cold, so I needed advice from someone who had experienced winter as an immigrant. I called the Sudanese WUSC student who arrived a year before me to come to my place so we could go out together. When we went outside, the weather was much better than I expected. I fell in love with winter and everything about it.

Although I assumed winter would make life miserable, I was wrong. Winter brought a lot of wonderful joy, especially with the festivities and activities that people do during this season. Living in winter and walking on the snow felt like living on the moon. Experiencing the changing seasons from flowers blooming, green to golden leaves, to bare trees in the fall, the juxtaposition of the white winter and the vibrant life of nature in autumn was truly amazing. Although life at first seemed like it was limited to only people playing with kids in the snow, making snow people, or snowball fights, the season was also soon full of bustling activities such as ice skating, sledding, and skiing.

As soon as winter started, it felt like the Christmas holiday season also started. I was awestruck with how the streets, shopping centres, and buildings were decorated with colourful lights, Christmas trees, and festive ribbons. I was surprised at how people put up decorations outside their homes, such as lights, wreaths, and Christmas trees. These decorations contrasted massively with the Christmas decorations in our village, where people smeared their walls and floors with sledges, drawing newts, snakes, birds, cows, and animals on the walls with ash. The differences couldn’t have been starker.

Many of the families we visited had been planning and preparing their Christmas meals for weeks. They sourced ingredients well in advance to make dishes such as roasted turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and gingerbread cookies, ensuring every item they needed was ready for Christmas Day. In Toronto, the Sudanese WUSC student who arrived a year before introduced me to the Sudanese community church, from where I met many Sudanese community members who had migrated to Canada.

During the Christmas season, some Sudanese families invited me and the other Sudanese WUSC students into their homes to join them for dinner. It was interesting to see that the Sudanese community incorporated dishes from the Western culture and also maintained their traditional dishes, such as dried meat cooked with peanut butter, Kira (Sorghum Crepes), and molokhia leaves (Jews mallows) cooked with fresh meat into their Christmas feasts. The warmth and hospitality of the many Sudanese families made me feel truly welcomed and part of the festive season. It helped me feel at home.

During the weeks leading up to Christmas, we travelled with a LC to their family home in Kincardine by the coast of Lake Huron. It was a special time for the LC member to spend with his family and friends. I realised that Canadians are obsessed with spending time with their family. Many people travel long distances to be with their loved ones and celebrate the holiday together. My Christmas time in Kincardine was a true taste of Canadian Christmas culture, which reminded me of how we celebrated Christmas before the war. In peace times, people shared food, drinks, and cultural dance festivities during the Christmas season in our village. During my Christmas with the family of the LC, we exchanged gifts, shared meals, and visited temples. His mother took us to the temple.

Also, while in Kincardine during Christmas, the LC arranged for me to meet a woman I had met before Christmas in Toronto because she was travelling to the Kakuma refugee camp to collect data for her doctoral studies. I sent information to the people I left behind through her, as I didn’t have any way of contacting them then. These connections made me feel an affinity with the local community, but in truth, I was a stranger welcomed by a generous family. Although I enjoyed my Christmas festivities in Kincardine, I was also worried about my sister and where she could be during the festive season. I couldn’t help but reflect on the fact that if the war hadn’t uprooted us from our village, we could also be celebrating Christmas like the people in Kincardine.

Getting used to Canada

As the years passed, I became more acculturated to the Canadian weather. This was a far cry from the scorching heat I experienced while living in the Kakuma refugee camp. Canadian winters made the world feel slightly different, but in a good way. For example, the cold air breeze made it smell fresh, crisp, rejuvenating, and energising. I always felt walking on snow was like walking on the moon. Also, for whatever reason, Canadian snow made Christmas feel magical, with all the lights and activities that come with it. And the people, too, became more generous. The season brings relief to nature. Everything, like the sky, looks beautiful, serene, and blue, and even nature looks and sounds more pleasant. That was when I knew there was life to live in this world – a life of peace, love, and happiness. I felt complete peace without the fear of being killed or kidnapped. The frequent nightmares of flying like a bird away from people attempting to catch or kidnap me, and landing by the riverbanks. I used to experience dissipated, and occasionally, I experienced them.

Studying in a bridging program

I faced numerous challenges as a WUSC student in Canada. I arrived two weeks after classes had begun, which meant I had to juggle many competing priorities, such as adjusting to a new country, culture, and educational environment – all while studying and attending classes. It all felt initially overwhelming at first; however, with the right support and resources, and by maintaining the perspective that my situation was an improvement from life in the refugee camp, I stayed optimistic.

When I arrived in Canada, I thought I would start my undergraduate program immediately. However, my education took a detour via an academic bridging program. I was placed in an academic bridging program at Woodsworth College, one of the seven colleges at the University of Toronto. This was a surprise – I hadn’t been told about this. With me in the bridging class were two other WUSC students, a woman from South Sudan and a woman from Myanmar. We were all frustrated at being placed in the bridging program, but we found strength in our common identity as WUSC students. We supported each other in a class of about 35 to 40 students, most of whom were Canadian students attempting to enter undergraduate studies at the University of Toronto.

On reflection, I didn’t mind starting from the academic bridging program because I believed it would give me a better chance of filling the gaps in my education. Having only completed O-Level education, I thought that the program would help me catch up on Advanced Mathematics, Chemistry, Biology, and Physics, which students typically learn in A-Levels in Uganda. By completing the bridging program, I felt I would be better prepared to start my degree and participate like my peers.

But when I joined the academic bridging program, I didn’t have the option to choose which subjects I wanted to study so I ended up studying contemporary Canadian history, which I wasn’t happy with this, even though I found it interesting. I felt like I was wasting my time learning about a subject that would not be useful for my future degree. I was passionate about science, so being distracted by History felt pointless. In order to pass the bridging program and enter the undergraduate program, a student needed to achieve a mark of over 70 per cent. I was concerned about this condition, and there were a few reasons for that concern.

First, I felt my educational background hadn’t prepare me to take subjects in the Arts and Humanities streams. In Uganda, students know what streams they would like to take in their education right from their third year of high school. I had already chosen the Science stream in my education and was pressing forward in that direction. All my formative years in high school were spent in science classes. While I had studied Geography and History, that was only during the first three years of high school. This meant that I wasn’t prepared to grasp the art of writing essays and the critical thinking needed to be demonstrated when writing essays. Therefore, I felt my university education could cease if I didn’t achieve the required mark, especially in an Art subject.

Second, I didn’t feel that the university trusted my academic capability, and therefore, it wanted to assess me further – in addition to my high school transcripts and TOEFL results I had already passed. The other two WUSC students in my class also shared this view. I had initially assumed it was because I had only completed O-Levels but the other two WUSC students had finished high school. The South Sudanese woman had completed Form Four in Kenya, and the woman from Myanmar had completed “Mattayom 6” (the final year of high school) in Thailand, and both passed exams to go to the university.

I was also frustrated with the academic bridging program because I struggled to explain what I was studying to other first-year students in my residence. I felt that their interest in bonding eventually ebbed because they didn’t understand what I was studying, and this potentially contributed to the challenges of making friends with other students in my first year in Canada. We – the three of us WUSC students in the bridging class – frequently talked about our frustrations and came to the conclusion that our respective colleges must have made the decision to place us in the bridging program.

Despite my initial frustration, I eventually accepted that being enrolled in the academic bridging program was a good decision. The History class introduced me to Canada’s past and helped me see myself in the context of the country’s historical lens. It also provided a soft start for me to cope with the challenges of resettling in a new country as a WUSC student. In our village, there was a saying that “you can’t eat two coconuts in your mouth simultaneously” – meaning it was difficult to focus on many priorities simultaneously. I could have struggled even more if I had been thrown into full undergraduate studies while adapting to life in Canada.

Part of my adaptation to life in Canada involved paying for my own living expenses after first year as opposed to growing my own food, which meant I had to juggle education and work to pay for my groceries, accommodation, transportation, and bills. These conflicting priorities created competing demands at a critical time, especially because of the challenges associated with being new to Canada. Like many immigrants, I didn’t have a social network or family support in Canada, and I was concerned about finding a job and a place to live after the one-year support from the local WUSC committee ended. The academic bridging program allowed me to take it easy by taking only one subject. I used the rest of my time working part-time at the registrar’s office as a receptionist, getting used to my new surroundings, exploring Toronto, and building the social support and networks I needed to feel at home. Therefore, I really felt ready when I started my undergraduate program at the University of Toronto.

Starting undergraduate studies

I spent the whole academic year (September 2003–May 2004) studying in the bridging program. After completing the bridging program, I enrolled in a Life Science undergraduate program at the University of Toronto. At the time, students who wanted to study Science at the university would start with a Life Science program before specialising in their specific area after their first year. Despite having spending a year in the bridging program, I still didn’t understand how the undergraduate education system worked. This differed significantly from the education system in Uganda, where undergraduate course selection was based on what a student did in their A-Level courses. I didn’t understand the course structure and requirements, the academic expectations, or how to access academic and career support services during my undergraduate studies.

My first experience of a Calculus class was like learning a foreign language. I didn’t understand anything that was being taught in class. I also took classes in Chemistry, Psychology, and Biology. Likely due to the inadequate preparation of my O-Levels, everything was new to me, and I struggled to understand any of them. I found the education system in Canada to be a lot more self-driven than what I was used to in school in Uganda. Back in high school, my teachers had provided me with all the necessary materials and information I needed to learn. Adapting to using online and library resources to learn in Canada was brand new for me. Even though I purchased the textbooks, I struggled to then connect them with other resources, like books, journals, and educational films.

Furthermore, being in a class with over 1,000 students, where it was difficult to interact and ask questions, during lectures was quite surprising for me. Back then, lectures were only delivered in person, and while I could print the lecture slides, there was no recording available, so I had to rest on my memory. Some students had audio recorders by the lectern to capture the audio during the lectures, but I didn’t have a recorder, so I couldn’t do that. I truly believed that I wouldn’t be able to compete with other students in my large classes. The lecture hall had around 1,500 students, and the tutorial classes had about 35 students. It was difficult to interact with my lecturers in such a big class, so I used my tutors in the tutorial to ask questions about concepts and seek further clarification on areas I found confusing. Besides interacting with my tutors and seeking career support counselling once in my subject selection, I received no other academic support.

As a result, I dedicated many hours to studying, practising, and memorising key concepts from my classes, but I struggled a lot during my first and second years because of my lack of foundational knowledge in certain subjects. When I wasn’t doing my paid job in the evenings at the Pratt Library, I spent hours practising Organic Chemistry synthesis on blackboards in the library basement. But despite these efforts, I failed my Physical Chemistry and had to repeat it. I also received low grades in Calculus, Organic Chemistry, and Molecular Biology, barely passing them despite putting in a lot of effort. This made me more frustrated that I had spent a whole year studying contemporary Canadian history instead of focusing on subjects that would have helped me better, but at the same time, I knew I had done well, considering my lack of knowledge in those advanced topics.

Despite these initial struggles, I remained optimistic that my grades would improve in my third and fourth years, as these subjects would build upon the foundational knowledge from the first two years. I was determined to progress my education at all costs. Quitting was never an option for me. My grades improved in my third and fourth years. I was satisfied with my achievement, although I barely met the grade point average (GPA) requirement for my honours bachelor’s degree. I ultimately graduated with double majors in Human Biology and Pharmaceutical Chemistry.

Lack of settlement support

Although the WUSC program provided pathways to both university education and permanent residency, we – the Sudanese WUSC students I knew – didn’t receive any support outside of the university. The WUSC local committee support was limited to the educational aspect only, apart from the initial support in obtaining documents like the social security number, and healthcare card. Due to the limited support that the local WUSC committee provided for resettlement, we didn’t know how to apply to bring our family to Canada. Some students, especially those from Myanmar and Afghanistan, managed to bring their family members with strong community support. However, some of these Burmese and Afghani WUSC students dropped out because they wanted to work to bring their families to Canada, with the plan of returning to university once their families arrived in Canada. While some of these Afghani and Burmese students succeeded in bringing their families, others didn’t, and are still trying to bring their family members to Canada after being in the country for over twenty years.

Family and network support was perhaps the most difficult to develop. Like most Sudanese students, I was unable to access support for bringing family members from refugee camps to Canada because of the lack of community support in this regard. If the LC had been able to connect WUSC students with resettlement services beyond those offered by the university, it could have helped relieve the pressure on students trying to bring their family members to Canada. Providing support for WUSC students to apply for family reunion settlement could have simplified the settlement process, but this was beyond their remit.

Financial challenges

Other financial concerns created significant issues for me. I faced difficulties covering my living expenses and accessing financial aid after the year of support ended. After one year of arrival to Canada, I was asked to repay the transportation cost paid by the Canadian government for my flight to Canada. This is part of an agreement between all privately sponsored refugees and the Canadian government, where the government pays for students’ flights and travel costs upfront, and then WUSC students reimburse the money once they are settled. I had to find approximately $800 CAD to reimburse my flight costs from Kenya to Toronto. I had to balance work at the Pratt Library and study to make ends meet, which was stressful and distracted me from my studies because I didn’t receive any welfare money, which led to financial hardship. The part-time work I did in the library was only enough to pay for rent and bills. Sometimes, I ran out of money for food and necessities like soap, so I had to take on extra casual work. When I finished work at midnight at the Pratt Library, I went to Robert Library to study, which was open 24 hours. I would study from 12:30 a.m. to 3:00 a.m., and then run home to sleep. I slept from 4:00 a.m. to 7:30 a.m., and then rushed to laboratory practicals, which used to run from 8:30 a.m. to about 12:30 p.m.

Because of my busy schedule, I had limited time to take care of my hygiene and went for days without showering because I had to rush from laboratory practicals to lectures, from lectures to tutorials, and from tutorials to work in the Pratt library. And because of my hard work, I had become proficient in Chemistry, and other students started seeking my help with some advanced concepts they were struggling with. Often, the table I studied at was full of other students in chemistry taking the same course as me. However, in the process of regaining my academic prowess, I neglected my personal hygiene. I didn’t realise how bad my hygiene had gotten until it started to bother the people around me.

I used to study a lot with a friend of mine from a Nigerian background who was born and raised in Toronto. One day, while we were studying together in the library with her, she pulled me aside from our study table to tell me that I smelt and asked if I could go and change. I quickly ran to my residence, showered, and changed into clean cloths. Having left my books in the library, I had to return to the library rather than being embarrassed. I was grateful to my friend for telling me I smelt instead of starting to avoid me because of it. From then on, I started paying more attention to my hygiene.

Navigating culture shocks and adapting to life in Canada

During my first year, students at North House used to go to a local pub on the campus every Friday evening to socialise. Some students took me once to the pub. In the pub, most students drank beer and alcohol, and some smoked. The pub was noisy, and it was difficult to hear the conversation. I wasn’t used to a pub and hadn’t been to one before. Where I come from, few of my generation drank beer and alcohol or smoked. I was surprised to see that many Canadian students did so. I excluded myself from these social activities, and as a result, I experienced some social isolation because of it.

Moreover, I found that most Canadian students had a relaxed attitude towards life and tended to take things as they came without feeling stressed. This conflicted with my culture because I come from an agrarian community where life is not taken for granted, and we survived by tilling the land with our hands. Also, I imagined they had families who could support them if life alone became hard. As I have already discussed, I didn’t have any family support that I could fall back on when I struggled with my living expenses. Therefore, I couldn’t live the relaxed life of a Canadian student, which further contributed to my social isolation. When my Canadian friends invited me to a pub on the weekends, which they often did, I would always decline.

Moreover, I faced conflicting views about what was appropriate. Unlike me, most of my friends were open to various ideas and were typically flexible in their approach to situations. There were instances where some students encouraged me to try eating seafood such as prawns, lobsters, and oysters. However, I refused to taste any of these foods because we never ate them in our village. There were several types of meat that I didn’t eat, including pork, meat from animals without hooves, fish without scales, birds with webbed feet, or animals that had died of natural causes. I didn’t drink tea or coffee, except when the tea was prepared with caramelising sugar. My views about what food to eat and what not to eat were difficult to change, which created a significant difference from many Canadian students. I clearly remember several events where my views conflicted significantly with those of the people who were helping me. These were some nuances that were not loudly talked out, but one can sense by how people around responded. Some of these nonverbal cues included facial expressions, such as frowns, narrowing of the eyes, moving eyebrows downward, twitching the mouth, turning the face away, or changing the topic immediately. Although nobody spoke about these non-verbal cues, I perceived disapproval or disinterest.

For example, an incident occurred when two student coordinators took me grocery shopping in the evening. At that time, I had only been in Toronto for a few weeks. On our way to the shopping centre, as we walked along Charles Street West towards Bloor Street, we crossed paths with a man in a motorised wheelchair. It was dusk, and the gentleman had his lights on. It was my first time seeing a motorised wheelchair. I couldn’t help but speak to the man, and I told him that I liked his wheelchair and that it was cool. I saw the two students’ coordinators hide their faces, and put their hands over their mouths. They didn’t speak but continued as if they felt embarrassed by what I said. I couldn’t understand their reactions, which seemed to suggest that I had done something wrong when all I felt I had done was compliment the man on his wheelchair. I didn’t realise that compliments such as mine were viewed as stigmatising people who living with disabilities in Canadian society at that time.

After I caught up with two students’ coordinators, I asked them about their reactions when they saw me talking to the man in the wheelchair. They explained that the man might have thought I was mocking him. Although I didn’t completely agree with their assumptions, I understood their point of view. I realised that people in Canada are more mindful of their words and how they might impact others. Over time, I became more careful about my actions to avoid unintentionally hurting anyone. However, this meant I had to change some of my cultural habits, such as greeting strangers, and conversing with people I didn’t know. For instance, I stopped greeting strangers and refrained from casual physical contact, such as shaking hands when meeting someone new after moving to Canada.

Another clash with Canadian culture happened with how social friendships are practised. When I first arrived in Canada, we – the male Sudanese WUSC students – used to walk down the street holding each other’s hands, as boys often do in our culture. However, I soon learned that this gesture was interpreted as a display of romantic affection in Canadian society. Because we were boys, it was assumed that we were a gay couple, which was a total misinterpretation. In our culture, it is common for girls to hold hands with other girls and for boys to do the same with other boys, but the interpretation of this in Canada led us to stop this practice. This shifted the ways we practised friendships and created distance.

Another example of the cultural disconnections is with food; my food habits were completely different from most of my Canadian friends. When I got to Toronto, I was introduced to Chinatown because the LC felt it might be an appropriate market where I could find some familiar food. It took about 30 minutes to walk one way from my residence to Chinatown. The LC were right; Chinatown was where I bought most of my food because it had produce that reminded me of our cuisine. I frequently went to Chinatown to buy cabbage, which I cooked mixed with beans, which was my go-to meal. Many of my friends were surprised to see that I ate just cabbage and beans because meat is a big part of the Canadian diet. One day, we were walking with some of the LC members to Chinatown to get some food for me. There were a lot of people who were homeless in Chinatown, and I was surprised by it. I couldn’t believe Canadians didn’t want to give rooms, food, or money to support these people experiencing homelessness because it was a rich country. Shopping in Chinatown showed me that some people struggled to survive in Canada, which was a far cry from my perception of the stress-free life I had imagined when dreaming about leaving Kakuma. I had assumed there was no worry or struggle in Canada, and everything was available to sustain life, so seeing people living on the streets was a shock. Whenever I saw someone begging for money, I gave them a Loonie (one dollar coin), but didn’t know the LC members accompanying me to do groceries disapproved of my actions. On one occasion, a LC member spoke to me, expressing concerns that giving money could potentially worsen the person’s situation by enabling harmful behaviours such as drug or alcohol use. While I didn’t argue with their reasoning, I internally disagreed with the notion that all people experiencing homelessness would use donations to pay for drugs or alcohol. I thought I could have easily been in their position if I hadn’t received help.

This experience made me realise the impact of societal perceptions on people in need in Canadian society. Before the war, it was common for people in our village to share their homes and food with strangers in need without being asked for assistance. The Canadian approach was jarring; I was dismayed that some Canadians disapproved of giving money to people experiencing homelessness. From then on, I was more cautious when giving money to a person experiencing homelessness, especially when in the company of others. But I believed that I could have been one of those people experiencing homelessness if others hadn’t shown me generosity. I felt their story was mine, making it difficult for me to desist from giving a Loonie.

Volunteering in Canada as a student

After my first year living on campus, I moved to Stephenson House, a co-ed residence in Victoria College, in September 2004. Stephenson House accommodated about 12 students, most of whom had financial difficulties but who were resourceful and took the initiative to give back to their community. Almost all of the students we lived with in Stephenson House were involved in campus clubs and student-driven advocacies. Living in this residence also had some requirements. Firstly, we had to live together as a family, meaning we were responsible for maintaining the general cleanliness of the house, planning meals, buying groceries, and taking turns cooking. We held a weekly meeting to plan our meals and developed a weekly roster. Whoever was rostered on kitchen duty cooked for the whole house. We were all responsible for managing costs associated with bills and other expenses.

Secondly, community engagement was strongly encouraged. While living in Stephenson house, volunteering became an important part of my life. At the time, it was a common practice among students at the University of Toronto to volunteer in the community. I volunteered at a homeless shelter and a harm reduction centre in Toronto. I also actively got involved in the LC, supporting other WUSC students from diverse backgrounds who arrived after me. I provided support and guidance that local Canadian students couldn’t relate to but that made sense to WUSC students.

I also informally supported other WUSC students from other universities in Ontario who needed help. Given the central location of Toronto, I became a contact and support person for some of the students who went to smaller regional universities in Ontario because many of these students felt lonely or their university didn’t have a course that they wanted to study. They contacted me for support if they decided to transfer to the University of Toronto, and if they couldn’t afford accommodation, I connected them to other Sudanese families and friends in Toronto for somewhere to live until they could find a place to rent.

In my third year, I became the president of the Sudanese Student Association at the University of Toronto. Most of the Sudanese students studying at the University of Toronto were there through the WUSC Program, but a few Sudanese students had migrated with their parents through the Canadian government resettlement program. As I lived on campus, my place became a central hub for Sudanese students to meet. Although Stephenson House could fit 12 students, most would go home over the weekend. We used this opportunity to bond and develop social networks and support between the Sudanese students. As WUSC students, we struggled financially, but we supported each other through our social network. These volunteering opportunities and participation in the student campus life provided me with a rich educational experience at the University of Toronto.

Working in Canada as a student

Regarding employment, during my first year in Canada, the local WUSC committee at Victoria College provided a small stipend and arranged part-time employment for me at the registrar’s office to help me pay for my living expenses. When my one-year part-time employment at the registrar’s office ended – because it was reserved only for new WUSC students – the local WUSC committee helped me find a part-time job at the Pratt Library. I worked at the library until I finished my undergraduate degree.

Due to a lack of finances, I couldn’t afford to learn how to drive until after I graduated from university. Not being able to drive and not having a car made it extremely difficult for me to hold summer jobs when I couldn’t get a full-time summer job at the library, and I had to do odd jobs, such as painting houses, packaging products in processing plants, and operating factory machinery. Commuting was a perennial problem; Canada is a big country, meaning some of these jobs were a great distance away, and public transport was poor outside of metropolitan Toronto. My financial challenges also made me vulnerable to exploitation. For example, one contractor who hired me to paint houses never paid me and disappeared after I had completed the work. Sometimes, contractors paid me less than what was agreed or underpaid me because they charged me money towards transportation costs if they picked me up to get to a job.

Postgraduate outcomes

The days of low-paid, exploitative work ended after graduating. I got a job at a pharmaceutical company in Toronto and joined a post-graduate diploma program in Pharmaceutical Research and Development at the Toronto Institute of Pharmaceutical Technology. Although I was happy with my situation after working for a year, I also felt conflicted about working for a pharmaceutical company as it created tension with my personal values because while pharmaceutical products are crucial for human health, they often require people to have money to access them. I struggled with the concept of working for a profit-driven company and knew I needed to find a way out of the industry, but I knew I needed to plan carefully to avoid disrupting my life again.

As I was going through the conflict of considering a career change, I would regularly call my uncle (my father’s younger brother), who lived in a refugee camp in Uganda with his family. I wanted his advice, but I held back from discussing my plan for a long time; knowing the difficulties in the refugee camp, I reasoned my uncle would discourage me from my plan. Instead, I turned to self-help books and tried to make the decision on my own.

However, one day, when I called my uncle and without speaking to him about my plan, he asked me directly how my job at the pharmaceutical company would benefit my community back home. It was then that I spoke to him about my plan for further study in a different field if I got the opportunity. This question provided a turning point, making it even more urgent for me to pursue a job that could make a local impact. More than that, my uncle’s question invoked more of a desire for further education in me. I didn’t need any more signs to show that my decision to change careers was right. Through reading self-help books and my uncle’s unsolicited questions, I decided that I would change my career when the right opportunity came along.

I didn’t have to wait long for that opportunity. In 2008–2009, Canada started to experience a severe economic recession, and in response, the Canadian government created a program to offer scholarships to young people with full-time jobs in exchange for vacating their positions to make room for older employees who had lost their jobs and couldn’t change careers due to age. During this time, I visited Robert’s Library at the University of Toronto to meet a friend, and while there, I met an education agent recruiting Canadian students to study in Australia. This was the epiphany moment. I realised that I could quit my job and use the government scholarship program to study in Australia. This was my pathway to further study, to living in a different country, and to moving in a more community-impact direction.

One month after applying, I was accepted by three Australian universities to pursue a Master of Public Health. I decided to attend the University of Adelaide because I knew people who had moved there from the Kakuma refugee camps. Because I had already become a Canadian citizen, I had privileges that made obtaining a student visa for Australia easier. I received my visa within 24 hours, a much quicker process than for students from other countries. I flew to Australia in 2010 to start my Master of Public Health.