Saturday, July 13 in San Francisco

[Guest guest]

Hi everyone!

 

Thought some of you might be interested in hearing a little feedback on

what I refer to as an " Outdoor Farmed Animal Education Forum " that was

readily attended by many SFBAVeger's in San Francisco (conveniently

located at Market and Powell for you BART users), and coordinated by the

ever so motivating, Alka Chandna. I thought of the term above as a

co-worker referred it to me as a protest, which to me can have a

negative connotation. As I didn't see it as a protest at all, I quickly

explained it to him in the more positive light as 'educational.'

 

Since I had volunteered to be one of the cheerleaders (having gotten my

feet wet at the May Safeway Shareholders event in San Ramon), I decided

to be brave and do it again! Three of us wore the great red/white skirts

hand and pom poms made by Ms. Kelle Kamarcik (thanks again, Kelle!), and

I believe, made a positive impression to the onlookers, of which there

were many. How could you not notice three crazy girls (ahem, women)

cheering loudly in unison right out of the blue as you're waiting to hop

aboard a cable car?

 

We used the cheers:

" If your tummy needs a filling, choose compassion over killing! "

" Vegan vegan is the way, to healthy hearts, Start TODAY! "

and " Vegan is the way to go. When it comes to meat, JUST SAY NO! "

After repeating one cheer three times, we yelled out, " Gooooooo VEGAN! "

It was great fun!

 

We held up GO VEGAN signs (prompting a few folks to come by and ask what

vegan meant.) It was really hard to get up the nerve to start

cheerleading, but once we did it, it got much easier and it didn't

matter anymore (my fears, that is). We definitely caught

people's attention. Several people wanted to take pictures, and one

fellow Nora Kramer

knows videotaped us and the event and is broadcasting it a local

vegetarian tv show. Perhaps he or Nora can tell us more about that!

 

A couple comments sounded like people from out of town who wanted to

take pictures for someone they knew back home that was vegetarian, and

they wanted to show them! Cool huh?

 

People seemed interested in viewing " Meet your Meat " and prompted a lot

of discussion with folks, it seemed. And we handed out LOTS AND LOTS of

Why Vegans Alka's great brochures as well. We then retired at 2pm and

went to Golden Era for some great mid-afternoon lunch. I'd say there

were at least 20 people hanging around leafletting, socializing,

whatever, and about 15 folks went to Golden Era afterwards.

 

These kinds of events are truly worthwhile at whatever length of

" activisim " you

feel comfortable doing. Between cheers, I managed to speak to one gal

who was

watching the video, informing her of what all went on and answered

questions--she seemed very interested, so hopefully the subject left an

impression! And I spoke to a fellow in his 30's at length all about the

virtuesof a vegan diet--after first telling him (when asked!) what vegan

meant. He actually commented how he thought (in so many words) it was

meant to be that he accidentally happened to come by this way (when

apparently he normally didn't) and felt lucky he came upon us and

thanked me for all that he just learned. In the beginnings of our

conversation, I had given him a " Why Vegan " booklet and he was sort of

hesitant, thinking he didn't really want to read it. Especially because

if he knew about the industry, he would have to change, right? A fellow

walked by and saw the booklet and asked if he could get one, and he

happily gave it to him. Well, after we spoke for probably going on a

half hour, he then ASKED me for another one of those booklets because

he wanted to read it afterall! That to me makes it all worthwhile!!

 

Lots of the rest of the folks were talking to passers by as well, so I

know this was an informative event for all. Some folks took pictures, so

hopefully we might see a posting of them as well.

 

A SPECIAL THANKS, once again, to Alka for spearheading yet another

wonderful grassroots effort!!!!!!

 

Thanks for reading this, and hope to see and meet you at future events

such as these!

 

Lori Patotzka