arvida no canadian regional has ever parked a plane for lack of crew. Jazz has a good flow program going right back to the air cadet program. Encore has lots of coolaid and free hugs and still manages to staff their Q's. They Encore has almost reached the end of their expansion to 45 tails. Despite having a few people not show up at ground school because better offers came in no flight has ever been cancelled for lack of crew.
paradoxbox I also started in 2001 and had to go into another industry for nearly a decade because of 9/11. Married a Japanese woman but sadly never moved there. Perhaps you're really living the dream and don't know it.
That said, plenty of smaller 703 companies are having trouble attracting and retaining people. I don't know if salaries have moved in the last 17 years or not but the amount of time you have to put up with crap has drastically decreased.
If I could suggest looking at jobs in Yellowknife you might be able to use your Japanese skills on your days off and make a couple of extra bucks. Some of the best flying I ever did was for a company up in Yellowknife. It's no shinagawa but as far as northern jobs go, it's a pretty good place to be. The company I used to work for is taking guys with less than 500 hours and putting them in the right seat of 705 machines. I don't have to tell you that this was unheard of 15 years ago (5 years ago for that matter).
I'm not on here often but PM me if you want to chat. Best of luck.