Vegetarian for life

ingredients on the packages to ensure that there are no animal products in it. Celebrities are actively promoting their vegetarian lifestyle. Some restaurants clearly label their dishes with the words ‘unsuitable for vegetarians’.

And if we vegetarians can thank any one group for this change it is the ‘lifestyle conscious’ people, who realised the value of vegetable in our diets and promoted its importance in our lives.

Now I live in pure heaven, enjoying the fresh produce of a country that has the best of it. And when people hear that I am a vegetarian, a common reaction is, “You know, I only eat meat for the protein, otherwise I could easily be a vegetarian.” What a change from, “You know it is un-Australian not to eat meat” or “If God wanted us to eat greens, he would have made us sheep and cows”.

My children are not vegetarian and I respect their choice. Vegetarianism is not a neo-religion or a socially-invasive cult. It is a lifestyle choice that people choose either because it suits them, or is a necessary health requirement. It is for these people and for the ones who are vegetarians because of their faiths, that we began the ‘Label it if you table it’ movement. It has only one purpose, to request manufacturers and restaurateurs to ensure that products containing animal products are clearly labelled. And it is here that we need your help.

BY RANI JHALA

Dear Vegetarians for Life,

Thank you for the opportunity to address your meeting. I am the founder and promoter of ‘Label it if you table it!’

Many years ago, after a hunting trip, I decided the righteous path for me would be to walk down the path of vegetarianism. I was fifteen and still at school. It was not that I hated the taste of meat; it was that every time a dish was placed in front of me, I saw the terrified eyes of the animal whose life we had taken or I saw its mother mourning the loss of her infant, butchered to satisfy our human palate.

My decision came at a time when I was still at boarding school, where the school menu was strictly adhered.

Vegetarianism was not encouraged, with the only exceptions being on religious functions. On those days I ate freely and comfortably. The rest of the time, I passed on the meat to my fellow students and took their helping of vegetables.

Finally a fellow student gave me the idea of proclaiming non-religious functions as calls for a vegetarian diet. I had relatives dying once a month, and each death called for a fortnight’s abstinence from meat. I had ancestral prayer days where none existed and I had religious celebrations that were so specific to my clan that my teachers had never heard of them!

These white lies, while resting heavily on my soul, got me through a whole year. And by the end of that year I had passed out from the school and had returned to live with my parents. At least there, no one deterred me from the path I had taken, even though no one understood my desire.

Once home I became a full time vegetarian, from a part-time one. The exceptions to my vegetarian diet were eggs and dairy. No withdrawal systems, no cravings and strangely, no loss of weight. All was perfect, for in a land where a huge population was vegetarian, my new diet was easily adaptable. There was no need to let hosts know of my preference, for every home would always serve at least a couple of vegetarian dishes. Restaurants had a huge range on their menu. My vegetarian lifestyle was an accepted part of the Indian psyche.

In my twenties, I moved to Australia, a land renowned for its prime beef, succulent lamb and fresh seafood. A land where, in the year of my arrival, vegetables consisted of only the greens in salad, potato, peas and pumpkin. A land where I was told that being a vegetarian was akin to not having a life.

This second transition was as tough as ever. I remember being served a salad with a generous serving of prawns over the top at an exclusive restaurant. When I informed the waiter that I was a vegetarian, I watched in horror as he picked the prawns out of the salad, and left the fresh greens glistening from the prawn’s juices with the well-meant comment, “There you go ma’am, its vegetarian now!” Luckily the person sitting next to me was more than happy to add my salad to the prawns she had just inherited from me.

The next few years were like a comedy of errors as I walked through the maze of ‘deceptive vegetarian’ dishes. It is a coin I phrased in my first article called the ‘Perils of Vegetarianism’.

What did I mean by it? It is dishes that are sold under the banner of the name ‘vegetarian’ but hidden beneath its sanctimonious label, lurks the non-vegetarian elements. A vegetarian curry sold that is made with fish paste but not labelled as such, hashbrowns given out with the assurance that they have been fried in vegetable oil, yet the buyers are not informed that it is coated in tallow. Cakes and biscuits greased with lard. Serving spoons transferred between vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes without being washed.

My stomach too, became sensitive to nonvegetarian items. Cheese made with rennet caused severe cramps, soup made with chicken stock made me nauseous and desserts made with gelatine made me sick.

The first of the self-imposed restrictions came into force. While I still went to restaurants, I restricted my selection to baked vegetables, salads and desserts.

As time flew by, multiculturalism spread and locals began producing Asian and European vegetables. The selections and choices grew both at the supermarkets and the restaurants. Just ten years after I my arrival here, an all-vegetarian restaurant opened, and I was one of its first patrons. Ah, the sheer bliss of holding a menu in my hand and knowing that I could eat anything from it, and that every dish would be made from totally non-animal products. The vegetarian restaurants grew in number and my eat-outs were equally frequent.

Twenty years after my journey began, the platform has changed so much. An Australian colleague of mine will neither eat meat, nor even cook it. Another reads the list of

We regularly put up a surveys and petitions on our website. Help us make this a global movement by participating in it, and let the invasion begin.

Thank you.