(If your reading this as the first post of the three, scroll down to the original post so you can read them in order)
Meet Jean Pierre. A die hard vegan fitness athlete, nutrition and fitness consultant to the stars including vegan, Ellen DeGeneres. His passion for eating whole plant foods paired with heart-pumping exercise is his equation to living a long, healthy life. He shared with us the importance of choosing the "right" foods over the ones that may taste good for just one bite. Rethinking choices such as coffee and a donut in the morning and swapping that out for green tea and flax oatmeal or a green juice smoothie. He created three DVDs for those of us on the go, that want yummy nutritious vegan meals: "In The Kitchen With John Pierre & Friends", "When Bachelor Meets Homemaker" and "Vegan Weight Loss". Check out his website at http://www.johnpierre.com for more information!
His presentation was a segue into a cocktail hour with all the speakers from the event available to answer any questions. It also gave Carlitos and I a chance to mingle and enjoy the amazing vegan treats and local, organic vegan wines! Of course we were only drinking green smoothies, JP:) Surrounded by new friends we sat down to enjoy an amazing meal thanks to Uptons Naturals Seitan! To bad we can't find Upton's in our health food stores in Vermont but you can order them online. Check out Jeffs Uptons stache and Carlitos rockin the real thing;)
Following dinner was a screening of Vegucated, a film by Marisa Miller Wolfson that captured the personal transformation of three people from different backgrounds that agreed to go vegan for 6 weeks. You will have to check out the film to find out what happens:)
As night fell it was time for dancing and a good old fashion HOE DOWN! Carlitos and I were on the dance floor for a short time but felt exhausted from the day. We decided to curl up in our sleep bags and fall asleep to the sounds of crickets.
Sunday morning...1,2,3...we heard the voice of Jean Pierre hosting a boot camp workout at 8am. Darn. I really wanted to be there but I dosed back to sleep ;) We woke up an hour later and ate an amazing vegan brunch and had a "coffee talk" with the panel of staff and speakers from the weekend. It was much like a Q & A, really fun and informative.
After "coffee tawwwllkk" Bruce Fedrich and Alka Chandna presented. The pairing are an amazing couple that both work in animal welfare. Bruce is a senior director for strategic intiatives at Farm Sanctuary and had worked for PETA for 15 years where he met Alka Chandna, a PH.D senior researcher focusing on animal experimentation issues. They shared with us how to be an effective vegan advocate. Bruce co-authored a book called, The Animal Activists Handbook that has great tips on how to get your vegan message across. 1) Is being presentable meaning dont wear PJ pants leafletting, rockin' stickers on your car or laptop, wear vegan t-shirts, bring yummy vegan options to holiday events and share up to date vegan articles on social networking sites such as facebook!
The upbeat presentation was followed by one of a more serious tone with Timothy Pachirat a PH.D from Yale Univserity that worked undercover for 5 months as a liver hanger, chute worker and
quality control in a Nebraska slaughterhouse that kills more than 2,500 cows a day. His thesis book was called Every Twelve Seconds: Industrialized Slaughter and the Politics of Sight. His research explored the distance and concealment of the daily operations that enable massive processes of violence against animals and immigrant workers in our modern society. He shared with us the compartmentalization of each section of the slaughterhouse and how each department is closed off from the other. There are only three workers that actually participate in the slaughter. The other 197 workers are focused on working on their assigned animal part, meat packing or office duties. Each separate department have their own bathrooms, lunchrooms and do not interact with other workers in the slaughterhouse facility. The office side of the building is so segregated from the actual slaughter or "kill floor" there is no way to access that part of the building unless you were to walk out of the building and walk around the whole complex. It is set up this way so workers are so disconnected to what is actually happening on the "kill floor" that they never see live cow "product". For most of these workers which happen to be illegal immigrants are only there because they need money. This is a job with a very high turnover rate. The workers hired for processing are assigned to specific animal part for 8 hours every day whether that be a stomach, heart, liver etc. . It becomes a routine much like any other factory product whether textiles, computer parts or car parts. The emotional disconnect is blatant. What a profound observation by Timothy that in our every day lives we are separated or compartmentalized from seeing what is behind the "wall". As a consumer or even we rarely question what we are purchasing and the negative impact it created prior to our hands. Its important about being an informed consumer. What is interesting it that Timothy didn't become vegan until years after going undercover. He said he had to come to terms with his emotional response from the experience and it wasn't until he completed the book that it has come together for him. I couldn't even imagine what he witnessed!
After the presentation I was more than ready to go back up to the farm and spend some time with the animals before departing back to Vermont. We joined new friends and spent time in the fields with dairy cows and veal calves. (One of the calves are pictured in my Conscious Dish banner). They were so affectionate and sweet, rubbing up to get chin scratches any second they could. I savored every moment, inhaling the sweet smell of timothy grass on their wet noses.
We couldn't leave the farm without meeting Julia, the gestation sow recently rescued by the sanctuary with all of her little piglets. I couldn't help but squeal myself when I saw them. I wanted to take them all home. Each with a very different personality, they truly behaved like little puppies wrestling around in the mud pit. This was such a beautiful closing to an incredible weekend.
At around 4 the day at come to an end and we packed up our car and headed back home through the beautiful Adirondacks. What a journey this was! I encourage any of you reading this to visit a Farm Sanctuary in Watkins Glen, NY or at one of their two California locations. For more information visit:www.farmsanctuary.org
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