Ottawa (originally named and known as Bytown) belongs to the Canadian province of Ontario and is the capital city of Canada. The metropolitan population is a bit over one million people. The city lies in the Ottawa Valley, on the banks of the Ottawa River, a major waterway that forms the boundary between Ontario and Quebec.

Because of its proximity to Quebec, Ottawa is a bilingual city, reflecting its French and English heritage. It is a vibrant, multicultural capital city. Continue reading »

A land of vast distances and rich natural resources, Canada occupies most of northern North America. By total area, it is the world’s second largest country and shares borders with the USA to the south (Alaska to the northwest).

British and French expeditions discovered the land inhabited for millennia by various aboriginal peoples. Canada is today a federation of ten provinces and three territories. With a high-tech industrial society, Canada maintains a diversified economy, technologically advanced and industrialized. Continue reading »

According to a May 2008 survey of the Canadian newspaper MoneySense, the area of Ottawa-Gatineau (shared between Ontario and Quebec) tops the most prosper places to live in Canada, followed by the cities of Victoria (in British Columbia) and Fredericton (New Brunswick).

Among most important factors taken into account in this survey: weather, jobs, home prices, crime, availability of doctors, walking or biking to work, air quality. It was not about who has the best scenery, best restaurants or best beaches. The results can be used by people planning to relocate, to invest in real estate or just to compare how their own community ranks against its neighbor cities. Continue reading »

The 2004 Quality of Living Survey of Mercer Human Resource Consulting established a ranking with Best Cities to Live in for Expatriate Workers. Five out of first six cities are Canadian, with Ottawa, the national capital, topping the list. It is followed by Vancouver and Calgary.

As expected, countries open to a large number of immigrants (such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand) performed best. From Europe, a special mention for Germany (with five cities in top 20). From US, only Honolulu appears in the list. Ranking is based on a derived index, in which both the quality of living index and the cost of living index have been included. Continue reading »