How we found ourselves in CANADA!
Featuring Rusizana, and Alexis Ndanyuzwe
Landing in Canada is not the finish line of the immigrant journey; it is the quiet, demanding beginning of learning how to build a life that lasts.
Every newcomer stepping off a plane into Winnipeg carries years of anticipation, but the path here is rarely straight. For Rusizana, the ambition to move abroad started in 2013, winding through years of applications to Norway and Australia until pandemic border closures in 2020 forced a pivot to Canada. For Alex, the road meant waiting nearly eight years of refugee processing in Kenya, leaning on faith through prolonged uncertainty until the right door opened.
Icyo nabwira ababyeyi n'urubyiruko: ni byiza ko umwana agira uburenganzira, ariko bugire aho bugarukira. Iyo umwana abonye amafaranga ya mbere, yumva ubuzima burangiye. Ariko nyuma y'imyaka ibiri cyangwa itatu, umubiri uraneka ukabona ko wari ukeneye kwiga." (“It is good for a child to have freedom, but it must have boundaries. When a young person gets that first paycheck, they think they've made it. But two or three years down the line, the body wears out and you realize you needed that education.
Rusizana
Once on the ground, the immediate shock wasn't just surviving a prairie winter plunging into severe negative temperatures. It was decoding everyday Canadian life. From the awkwardness of adjusting to small courtesies like holding doors and making direct eye contact to sitting in university lecture halls as the only Black student wrestling with accent anxiety, finding belonging required constant courage.
Yet the most deceptive trap facing young newcomers isn’t the cold or the culture shock; it is the immediate allure of minimum wage. Coming from communities where tuition fees are an uphill struggle, landing in a system where high school is free and entry-level warehouse jobs are readily available creates an easy illusion of wealth. Young people buy cars, take on overtime, and slowly abandon school, trading certificates and degrees for hourly labor that inevitably wears out the body. As Alex and Rusizana remind us, real empowerment means resisting the shortcut, using accessible education and student grants, and choosing long-term stability over short-term comfort.
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Every episode of Roots & Voices is filmed at U Multicultural Channel's studio in Winnipeg — thank you for the space and production support.