When we looked at the points required in 2005 for New Zealand, we noticed with a shock that about a month after we first looked and saw we didn’t qualify, New Zealand Immigration Service had dropped the points to a point where we easily qualified . This meant that we could have been living in New Zealand years ago.

But things happen for a reason – our business was just starting to find it’s feet at that stage and we still had a few important business lessons to learn before we could leave. If we had left at that stage, it would have been financial suicide.

What a good feeling it was for me to have the opportunity to apply for a country I wanted to go to AND Mel was now finally standing next to me in the queue and just as happy to be in the queue.

Now I am a very thorough person and when I am enthusiastic about something there is no stopping me. We then spent the next few months researching everything we could about New Zealand to see if it would be a place we would want to live in.

As we had decided that we would rather save as much money as possible for when we arrive, we decided against a Look, See and Decice (LSD) trip. This is obviously a risk, but we have done more research than into this than than for anything else we have done before so are pretty confident with the decision.

I am a strong believer in destiny and that things happen for a reason.

I have always known that my place in the world is not in South Africa. I don’t know why, I have just known. Because of this I have always known that I will immigrate, but have never known where to or when, so for me the whole immigration process has been a natural procession of where I know my life is headed.

For Mel she has always been open to the idea, but never really gaven it much thought even though she knew that we would be leaving South Africa at some point in time.

When Candice was born in 2001, I knew the time was right as at this point I didn’t really see a future for her here in South Africa in 18 years time. I then started to actively persue my lifelong goal of immigrating.

We started looking at the the most common destinations for South Africans : Australia, New Zealand, UK and USA. But despite having qualifications and experience, I didn’t have enough points to qualify for any of these countries. The idea was shelved for a couple of years, but never forgotten.

Then in July 2003 a friend of ours told us about another of his friends that had move to Canada. Untill then Canada wasn’t even considered as a possible destination. After he left I quickly went and checked the points requirements for immigrating to Canada. We Qualified !!!

I then immediately started my research in earnest. Mel however wasn’t as enthusiastic as I was. She didn’t like the idea of living in a country where you are ‘under snow’ for half the year. Though not happy about the idea, she agreed that we needed to leave.

Although I continued my research into Canada every night, and chatted with folks in Canada, I was also not too happy with moving there for two reasons : a) Mel didn’t really want to go (a recipe for failure) and b) I also didn’t like the idea of being ‘snowed under’ for half the year. Needless to say I know a hell of a lot about Canada now and would love to visit one day, but never got anywhere near submitting an application.

Nov 2005 – after a long discussion Mel and I decided that if we couldn’t move to a country with comparable weather then we would call the whole idea off. We then sat down together and relooked at the ideal countries we thought would suit us better. First option was New Zealand for both of us so we started there.