Just landed? Resources available.

I live in Calgary, Alberta and there are numerous resources available for new immigrants. This post is about some of the resources that can help ease your first few months and some that will help you with other stuff down the line.

•          Food Bank: there is a main food bank within the city. Food can be quite expensive and you don’t want to spend most of your money on food, especially if you have kids. A visit to the food bank once a month will go a long way to alleviate the stress of spending a lot of money on food. You can get cereals, baby food, rice, pasta, canned food, canned tomatoes, e.t.c. from the food bank. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, no one needs to know you went to the food bank, you are helping yourself and your family and that’s all that matters. If you land in Calgary, below is the address and contact details.

Call the Food Bank for hamper request. Hamper request hot line – (403) 253-2055. After requesting for a hamper, you can pick up at their address: 5000 11 St SE, Calgary, AB T2H 2Y5.

•  Centre for Newcomers:  This center provides various resources to immigrants. There are free job and career trainings, English classes for immigrants who don’t speak English or can just manage to get by with a few words, free tax filing available during tax season e.t.c.

Check their website: http://centrefornewcomers.ca

•       Calgary Catholic Immigrant Society: The CCIS is a fantastic place for newcomers to be. They have quite a lot of career training and integration resources. If you need advice for daily living, someone is readily available to help you out, no matter what the issue is. Their mission statement is “In partnership, we empower immigrants and refugees to successfully resettle and integrate”. Need me to say anything more?

 Website: https://www.ccisab.ca

I’ll continue this in other posts. If you land in any city in Canada, there are all forms of resources available for free. Find them and make your transition easy for yourself and your family.