[TheGenuineArticle]

I moved from Vancouver (Ontario native) to Montréal about 13 months ago with very little French only a few months before had I been teaching my self a little bit through an iphone app and through my local Québecois friends.

I'm not going to say it has been easy and my French still is far from parfait but I can get by in my daily life now and have at least one friend who I spend more time speaking in French than in English with.

Jobs are scarce but if your desperate you can work for a company called Opinion Search calling people to do surveys its located downtown the pay is bad but its an easily obtainable job. There are "some" decent anglo only jobs but being unilingual in this city is kind of defeating the purpose of living here as you miss out on so many things the city offers.

DON'T live West of Parc unless you live in Verdun. It's easy to slip into the anglo-bubble move to the Eastern Plateau, Petite Laurier or the area around Parc La fontaine or if you want really cheap rents Hochelaga. (these are all inner city neighbourhoods) Where you will be forced to speak French especially in Hochelaga as its very working class.

But the best thing I did was go to an intensive French class when I first arrived it helped me meet a lot of new people as well who had recently moved to the city and were learning French. I went to Centre-Saint Louis in Le Plateau but there are many scattered across the city. The courses are essentially free (75$ for 4 months) and come in 16-20-30 hours a week.