Grand Central Station Dept: Emerging from the subway at Bathurst, the apprehension returned, if only for a moment. This was once Grand Central Station for the black immigrant community. The cops camped out there such was the perceived danger of the multitude of black kids pouring out of Central Technical School, bubbling, shouting, ghetto blasting with teenage abandonment. Now, it s just another cold subway station, according to The Star. I m back in the neighbourhood because some 60 people from that time have gathered at the Trane to reminisce about a man who is all but forgotten: Al Hamilton, founder of Contrast , now defunct and was back in the old neighbourhood at The Trane Studio restaurant, across the street from where I spent my first night and first year in Canada, back in the day when man was rooting around the surface of the moon with one small step for man, one giant leap . . . Bathurst St. was the axis of immigrant Caribbean-Canadian life. Honest Ed s was the black Eaton s. Go north past the subway to patty shops, barber shop, beauty shop. Go south from Honest Ed s and you pass Ram s Roti, then Lennox St. Turn right to number 28, Contrast Newspaper , the eyes, ears and voice of Canada s Black Community. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Saskatchewan Dept: Like the Alberta-B.C. delegation, the Saskatchewan group, which includes 27 employers, has a big presence at the Working Abroad job fair in Dublin this weekend, giving Canadian exhibitors close to 40 per cent of the booths. The Saskatchewan government has set up a website that greets potential Irish emigrants with the message Welcome to your future and hundreds of job postings. The province is even sending immigration officials to help applicants speed the process of moving to Saskatchewan, while Mr. Wall will greet job seekers on Saturday, according to Globe and Mail. Among the exhibitors is Kevin Dahl, co-owner of Nipawin, Sask.-based KaR Contracting, which builds giant metal storage bins attached to grain elevators across the Prairie provinces and has had trouble holding on to employees. This past year we needed 15 to 20 and couldn t get any more than 12, he said. We d hire a bunch of guys and they d just disappear. There s so much work in Saskatchewan that if you have a bad day, you can start 10 other jobs tomorrow. He s hoping to hire up to 10 metal workers this weekend. We have a construction boom; they have a bust, said Abigail Fulton, vice-president of the British Columbia Construction Association, whose 11-member delegation is meeting with Irish government, industry and union representatives in Dublin this week. The meetings, she said, are intended to lay groundwork and develop an inventory of people who are looking for work then match the names to companies looking to fill more than 100,000 construction jobs expected to open up in B.C. and Alberta in the next five years. They re pushing it really hard, said Chris Willis, a Canadian immigration consultant based in Hudson Heights, Que., who has attended the twice-annual job fair for the past six years. This time it s very much a Canadian-focused show. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Hollywood Dept: The Artist , a mute and monochrome ode to old Hollywood that was deemed a mere novelty at its Cannes debut last May, became the first silent film in 83 years to win Best Picture at the Oscars, according to The Star. The Artist also struck gold for director, actor, costume design and original score, a numerical feat that was matched by Martin Scorsese s Hugo , another homage to cinema that also won five trophies and the silence roared Sunday night at the 84th annual Academy Awards . The only other silent Best Picture winner was the World War I romance Wings , honoured at the very first Academy Awards in 1929. The Artist also has the distinction of being the first movie about Hollywood to win the Academy s top prize. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Brennan Armstrong Dept: Luckily it all went OK and I was able to cope with the pain, said Lynne Aitchison, who delivered baby Ziggy in the hotel bathtub, without medication or complications, according to CBC. Lynne Aitchison, 35, was a firefighter in Scotland, who moved to Whistler, B.C., and fell in love with her future husband. A year ago, she married Brennan Armstrong, a liquor store clerk originally from Ontario. Applied months before A Scottish woman married to a Canadian wound up having their baby in a hotel room across the street from a Vancouver hospital after she couldn t get provincial health-care coverage. We really just wanted to avoid the massive bills we were going to get, if we did go to hospital. However, we did want to be near one, should anything horrendous happen." (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Melissa McCarthy Dept: Each year there are some head scratchers included in the Academy Awards and here we do our best to answer some of burning questions that come up during a three-hour-plus telecast, according to The Star. Question #1: You may have wondered why Bridesmaids stars Melissa McCarthy and Rose Byrne stopped just before announcing the winner of the Best Documentary Short and whipped tiny bottles of vodka out of their dress fronts for a slug of hooch onstage. The reason? Someone had yelled out Scorsese! That calls for a drink. Bridesmaids star Maya Rudolph explained at the SAG Awards in January that the cast came up with the game while shooting the comedy. Rudolph, McCarthy and Kristen Wiig then proceeded to demonstrate. After all, Scorsese was in the house. And there he was Oscar night, too. It would be rude not to follow their own rules. So does that mean the Hugo director has to do likewise every time he hears their names and they laughed, they drank, they showed maybe just a wee bit too much skin. But of the night was a mystery man with a famous backside: Carl the seat filler. But at least one question remains unanswered. We have no idea where you can get a tuxedo like Carl s. They just don t make em like they used to. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Romney Dept: Mitt Romney misremembers Michigan WASHINGTON Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, battling furiously for the most conservative perch before the critical Michigan primary vote on Tuesday, also are looking just over the horizon a bonanza of delegates in the 10-state nominating contests that fall on one day just a week later. Romney and Santorum are virtually tied heading into the critical Michigan vote where the outcome could further boost Romney's tenuous front-runner position or upend the race for the party's nomination to challenge President Barack Obama in November. Michiganders vote on the same day as Arizona Republicans. Polls show Romney with a clear lead in the conservative far-Western state. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Linda Barnard Dept: The Star 's fashion reporter Derick Chetty, and movie critics Linda Barnard and Peter Howell live blog the fashion hits and misses and all of the gossip from the Oscars red carpet. Follow the conversation on Twitter using the hashtag #staroscars . Email Print Add to Favourites function Func ctl00 ctl00 cph contentBody cph leftContentContainer c bottom Template0 ctl00 CaseTemplate10 UserFavoritesButton1 funcName, param var p = param == undefined ? '' : ' if TD.Identity.IsAuthenticated var url = "/Toplets/User/UserFavoritesButtonPage?AssetUID=1136964" + p + " //alert url ; $.get url, , function data $ "#ctl00 ctl00 cph contentBody cph leftContentContainer c bottom Template0 ctl00 CaseTemplate10 UserFavoritesButton1 UserFavoritesButtonHolder" .html data ; ; Func ctl00 ctl00 cph contentBody cph leftContentContainer c bottom Template0 ctl00 CaseTemplate10 UserFavoritesButton1 'Func ctl00 ctl00 cph contentBody cph leftContentContainer c bottom Template0 ctl00 CaseTemplate10 UserFavoritesButton1' ; Report an error Rss var addthis share = templates: twitter: " title : url via @TorontoStar" div class=" (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Canadian Citizenship Dept: The Canadian action comes an investigation by a Hong Kong newspaper found that bogus "consultants" are teaching Chinese women how to hide their pregnancies and how to apply for Canadian visitor or student visas, according to Vancouver Sun. "We condemn the practice of circumventing our laws to game the system, leaving Canadians taxpayers with the bill. This is unfair and not right." Citizenship and Immigration Canada is poised to crack down on so-called "passport babies" or "birth tourism" - the practice of travelling to Canada to give birth so that child can have Canadian citizenship. "We are aware of crooked consultants who encourage pregnant women to illegally travel to Canada to give birth and gain access to Canada's considerable benefits," Citizenship and Immigration spokeswoman Candice Malcolm said Sunday. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Political Uncertainty Dept: China's economic miracle of the last 30 years, which has created about one million millionaires and up to 300 billionaires, has also created an environmental wasteland and great political uncertainty, according to Vancouver Sun. And as the Communist party prepares later this year to begin the process of transferring power to the fifth generation of leaders since the revolution of 1949, some would-be emigrants say they don't believe things can continue as they are and there are two overriding reasons driving thou-sands of China's wealthy to emigrate: desire for a better lifestyle, and lack of faith in the ruling Communist party. In surveys and interviews many of China's new rich say they feel insecure. They know that in a country without the rule of law and a dictatorial one-party regime, their wealth can be seized or otherwise taken away from them at any time. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.

Candice Malcolm Dept: "We are aware of crooked consultants who encourage pregnant women to illegally travel to Canada to give birth and gain access to Canada's considerable benefits," Citizenship and Immigration spokeswoman Candice Malcolm told Postmedia News on Sunday, according to Vancouver Sun. The government will introduce changes to the citizenship laws in the next year, Ms. Malcolm said and citizenship and Immigration Canada is poised to crack down on "passport babies" or "birth tourism"--the practice of travelling to Canada to give birth so that child can have Canadian citizenship--as a media report out of China reveals a ring of consultants who coach pregnant women to do exactly that. "We condemn the practice of circumventing our laws to game the system, leaving Canadians taxpayers with the bill. This is unfair and not right." (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.