GCA 0: The Great Canadian Adventure

After years of gruelling examinations and coursework, KH finally passed all of his acturial exams in 2012. To finally qualify as an actuary, he has to attend an induction course to the Society of Actuaries, and that must take place within a stipulated amount of time from the date of his passing the final paper. The course is basically just a formality and a short recap of all his effort. Basically the course is available in many locations and many time slots around the year. However, many take the opportunity to go as far away as possible to 'graduate' since employers usually foot the bill. And of course, there was no exception for KH. Initially, he had planned to attend the course in the US, but somehow that changed to Canada somewhere along the way. In Vancouver, the city where his ex lives no less! Truth be told, it was all very spontaneous. Happened some two months before our date of departure. Quite crazy. Had to settle leave plans (I had more than 40 days to clear, so my boss just nodded his head), flight tickets, accommodations, trip itinerary (KH dutifully did all the research... I'm such a bad BF!) and temporary resident visa within that time. The visa caused the most stress cause it was the biggest unknown. We chose to do it online because of the Osaka trip (submission via agent would have required we surrender our passports earlier). In order to successfully submit the application, one had to scan many, many, many supporting documents and pay CAD100. The documents are then reviewed by the embassy in Singapore (no embassy in KL) and when everything's in order, they would request for the passport to be couriered over. Best timing for us because the request came just right before our Osaka trip. Immediately after the Raya holidays, we submitted our passports via their agent in KL. Thank goodness the office was right beside my building. Much less running around. Metal detector, phone confiscation and MYR86. That pretty much settled it. Got our passports back about a week later. Green light!

P.S.: That visa lasts for 3 years... Wonder if there will be a repeat visit in the near future?