Find your tribe: Plan to make Multicultural Friends
When in a new environment your first instinct is to seek out people who are familiar. While this is a quick and easy way to feel at home in a new country, challenge yourself to make friends with people from different cultures.
It is a very challenging and humbling experience to be miles away from family and loved ones. So try to have an open mind and be prepared to learn about and befriend people from different cultures.
As the saying goes; better a friend who is near by than family that is far away and as the Jamaican saying goes ‘good Fren betta than pocket money.’
The good news is that through social media you can start the friend making process before you even get on the plane to Canada. You can reach out to Program Coordinators to see if there is any group for incoming students in your cohort. That's a good resource for meeting your classmates/school mates virtually beforehand and establishing some rapport.
The reality is that in order to survive and thrive in your new environment you will need to make friends and preferably friends from different multicultural backgrounds. It’s good for your well being and good for maintaining a healthy network for job hunting and finding other opportunities.
Plus you never know what you can learn from your new family/tribe and they from you.
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