Japanese girlfriend visiting me in Canada – questions at border control?

12/12/2022 8:52:39 PM

Besides the return ticket and the proof of employment, in English if possible, there are other issues to convince a possibly overzealous border office to let her through.

If she’s coming to stay 2 months only, be consistent:

  • Restrict the luggage. She probably won’t need summer clothes. (Does Canada have summer anyway?). Carrying some is a huge red flag. In the same way, she won’t need tonnes of Japanese food.
  • Take care with the messages and other stuff in the smartphone. Canada allows border authorities to search through the phone, even without any concrete trigger. Some searches like ‘japanese teaching jobs in Vancouver’ might be performed out of curiosity, but are fishy.
  • Mind the answers to the customs officer. He might well ask if she’s planning to visit Canada regularly for 2 months from now on. Is saying yes consistent with her job prospect? Is answering no consistent with what her boyfriend would answer?
  • Also make sure that nothing significant has changed since she was granted the eTA.
12/12/2022 11:19:15 AM

Japanese citizen here. I visited Canada twice in a very short window of time (like 10 days) in Winter 2017. I flew into Vancouver from Singapore (to make it more complicated I was a Singapore resident with a Japanese passport) first. In Vancouver my Singapore residence card was lost which caused me a problem at the border control.

I crossed the Canadian-USA border to visit Seattle from Vancouver. I had no problem with the USA side. I got into trouble when I tried to cross back into Canada from the USA as my flight back to Singapore was originated in Vancouver.

Unfortunately, the Canadian officer (let’s call him A) had a tough day, he tried to detain me. He and his colleague B searched my phone and all my belongings. The A did not believe me saying I was a Singapore resident as my Singapore Id was lost, no way to convince him.

The B was nicer. As soon as he looked into my postcards or tickets to tourist attractions in Seattle/Vancouver he decided to release me. But the B gave me the following warning: always print out my flight ticket to leave Canada.

In your case, I would do the following. In the event your gf got into trouble with the border guard I would flash my return ticket to leave Canada. Plus I would give them your phone number and have them call you. Then you could tell them that she is not visiting Canada indefinitely.

I hope all this makes sense and wish your gf a pleasant stay in Canada.

12/12/2022 1:55:38 AM

It will count against her that she is visiting her boyfriend (obvious motivation for overstay), and that with the second visit, she’d have spend a lot of time in relatively short period in Canada. The boundaries between "living in Japan and occasionally visiting Canada" and "living in Canada and occasionally visiting Japan" are getting somewhat blurred here.

Having a job lined up in Japan is definitely working in her favour: This is a reason for her to return as planned, and also an indication that the "where is actually the centre of her life"-issue is about to be resolved with "Japan" as answer. The more attractive the job the better. She should definitely have the appropriate documentation on her[1]. It will also count in her favour that she returned home as expected last time.

Overall, there is nothing inherently wrong with her planned visit. On the other hand, the overall situation seems to be amongst the most common settings which leads to refusal of entry for citizens of developed countries.

[1] Showing the job letter in Japanese of course isn’t going to help much, unless the border guard was already about to let her pass anyway. I would hope that if she gets into secondary inspection, it would be possible to get someone capable of reading a little Japanese in there, but I wouldn’t count on it. Translating it into English and getting someone to stamp it would be prudent.

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Hello,My name is Aparna Patel,I’m a Travel Blogger and Photographer who travel the world full-time with my hubby.I like to share my travel experience.

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