We had always dreamed of living in Europe, however Montréal called to us for many of the same reasons. The people there have an excellent work/life balance, it is a bilingual city with stunning architecture, and a socially responsible government.

We began our first day with a tour of the Institut de recherche en immunologie et en cancérologie (Institute for Research into Immunology and Cancer – IRIC), the component of the Université de Montréal that has offered Adrian a job for next year. It is a brand new building, with state-of-the-art facilities, full of light and well designed for the art of science. We had lunch with the students, and they seemed bright, happy, and enthusiastic. They all spoke fluent English for our benefit, but in side conversations alway spoke French.

As I would like to learn French, the other working language of the UN, Montreal would mean my immersion would be quite deep. There are excellent French schools that are cheap, and Adrian’s job may help to cover this. Also, as English is the other official language (not Dutch like Belgium), I would only have to learn one new language, not two. It actually appears that it will be quite easy for me to find a job in Montreal. IRIC will pay for a head-hunter to find me an interview, taking most of the stress out of that worry.

In the afternoon, we were given a tour of the city by Robert Turgeon, the President of Heritage Montreal and Dinu Bumbaru, key advisor to UNESCO’s World Heritage. Adrian and I spoke of some of our favourite World Heritage moments – getting engaged in Dubrovnik, married in Banff, and recently visiting Kiev and Lviv in the Ukraine. The parks were beautiful – in summer serving as a venue for picnics and puppies, and in winter the pond becoming a huge ice-skating rink for the whole city. Although out of all the candidate cities it has the lowest number of days above freezing (58%), it also has the highest number of days without rain (61%). I am told that the winters are still bright, despite the cold. In our other cities the winters would be grey and rainy. The attitude of the locals seems to be that they survive the winter every year (all four metres of snow), and that’s enough.

We had dinner in Little Italy, savoring the food and admiring the huge farmers market bursting with fresh produce.

Adrian’s friend Sylvie, a fellow immunologist, very kindly hosted our visit. We were able to stay with her for the weekend and experience what it is like to be a scientist in Montréal with a family. We spent the day in Old Montreal with Sylvie and her two children, Valerie and Loïc. The weather was stunning, and I was able to soak up the atmosphere and enjoy the bustle of the “Just for Laughs” festival.  During summer, there are non-stop festivals. During winter, there is ice-skating and cross-country skiing, and numerous winter festivals. The family seems very happy here, the children already speaking French and quickly learning English.

In the afternoon we wandered through Plateau, and marvelled at the beautiful stone Victorian townhouses that are somehow in our price-range, due to the very low cost of living in Montréal. We could live in a vine-covered mini-castle, with wrought-iron frills, parapets and turrets, opposite an open park and metres from a metro station. Even many of the old churches are being converted into condominiums, and we could even live in a home with a spire. The low cost of stunning housing in Montreal is a definite plus.

On Sunday we watched Wall-E at a local Cinemaplex. The movies are shown in both English and French, one just chooses the appropriate session. Valerie and Loïc obliged me by joining us in the English session. It was a relaxing and enjoyable end to three days in Montreal, and we both realised that we could be very happy living in this town, and eventually becoming Canadian citizens.

However, despite appearances, Montréal is on the opposite side of the Atlantic to the rest of Europe. No quick trains to Paris or London, no long weekends in Spain or Amsterdam. There are direct flights to over 120 destinations (New York in 90 minutes), but on rails we could only reach Ottawa, Toronto, Quebec City, and Halifax. Do we want to share a border with the USA?

My very brilliant husband has received job offers as a lab head in Montréal and Ireland, and has promising job interviews coming up in London and Belgium. We are so over the Crazy USA, but not quite ready to return to Australia. Now, we must decide where in the world we want to settle down and buy a home together. We are spending three days in each city in July, and I must use that time to plan out at least the next decade of my life. It is exciting and overwhelming. On paper, it looks like Montréal and London are winning out over Dublin and Brussels, but we shall see if that changes when I visit these places in person.