St. Patrick's High School students watched as 35 new Canadians took the oath of citizenship Tuesday morning.
Justice George Springate travelled from Ottawa to conduct the ceremony, something the 79-year-old has done for many years since retiring in 2013.
Preethi Alloji and her husband Srinath made the decision to come to Canada from India when they were newly married and arrived in Sarnia five year ago.
The Alloji family.
"We got an email from a consultant saying that Canada was opening its immigration program and was looking for people and his profession was on the skilled worker category list," says Alloji. "So, at that point in time, we were young and without kids so we thought lets try, lets go and see what life is like in Canada. So we applied."
She says the application process took three years.
"So, we thought maybe it's not going to happen," she says. "We will not get through. But then when I was pregnant with my first daughter, we got the medical requirement invitation and we were like, yay! Let's do it now. And that's how it happened."
Alloji says they truly feel like they're part of Canada now and says it wasn't a hard decision to make.
"Becoming a citizen actually feels like now we are totally a part of the society that we're living in," says Alloji. "My family won't be really happy with my answer, but it was an easy decision. We knew what we wanted when we moved to Canada from India, and we got everything that we wanted. So, we're very happy with our decision."
The ceremony at St. Pat's ties in perfectly with the Grade 10 curriculum, where students take a Canadian civics course.
