Big-hearted van brings vegan vibes to hundreds

By Tessa R. Salazar August 03,2016
AS HIGH as the sky—not the van’s head room, but Foton’s ambitious project (which includes its recently opened P1.2-billion Foton Philippines assembly plant). Photos by Tessa R. Salazar

AS HIGH as the sky—not the van’s head room, but Foton’s ambitious project (which includes its recently opened P1.2-billion Foton Philippines assembly plant). Photos by Tessa R. Salazar

 

Who says vans are good only for carrying people? To an extent, that is true. By their very design, vans are meant to carry as many warm bodies as comfortably as they can. In this case, the bigger, the better.

 

Take, for instance, the humongous, ridiculously tall Foton View Traveller, which made news during the just-concluded 2016 national election campaign season when it was named by auto customization king Victor “Atoy” Lim Llave as among the most sought-after vehicles for use in the campaign.

 

Not a surprise, he said, since this Chinese-made 15-seater van was “practical, spacious, economical and costs just half of its Japanese competitor.”

 

Looking beyond the economical and spacious aspects of big vans like the View Traveller, these people carriers can also haul in loads of the inherent kind-hearted nature of humans.

 

This author witnessed this just two weeks ago, when she brought some fellow vegan friends to a no-meat, no-dairy, no-animal cruelty food binge at the quaint vegan restaurant called Reasons in Lucena City in Quezon province, 150 kilometers south of Manila, on board a View Traveller.

 

Apart from enjoying the tasty vegan food fare masterfully (albeit hastily) prepared by owner Odessa Karuka (who wove magic with her no-meat, no-fish Sinugno ingredients of banana blossoms, coconut milk and tofu), the group also went out of its way to bring in veggie burgers for distribution to a hundred members of a relocated Aeta community at the foot of a nearby mountain.

 

The tasty meatless burgers were prepared by vegan mountaineers Isabel Lanas and Joey Divino, who also owned and operated the vegan restaurant and juice bar Juicesabel in The Collective on Malugay Street, Makati City.

 

The grateful kids and their parents in the Aeta community expressed their delight by going back for seconds.

 

FotonTravellerTessa5

LINING up for the meatless burger

To nourish their minds, and not just their bodies, the kids and their parents were also given educational reading materials and visual aids (comics and stickers) created by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) to encourage love and compassion for all animals.

 

Our group was ably assisted by five local volunteers of Food Not Bombs, a loose-knit group of independent collectives, serving free vegan and vegetarian food to others.

 

Later, these good-natured volunteers were able to feed up to 100 more individuals, and hand out more Peta materials in another resettlement community after our group left.

 

The next day, this author then went to a children’s home in Naic, Cavite province, to feed another 100 kids with no-meat, no-dairy delights such as langka nuggets, tofu bopis, crispy vegetable burgers and brown rice.

 

This was followed up a couple of days later with sweet offerings of suman pinipig (glutinous pounded rice flakes) and kutsinta (brown rice cakes).

 

Afterward, the children were given illustrated handouts linking meat consumption with climate change, environmental destruction, animal cruelty and lifestyle diseases.

 

Awestruck by the sight of the View Traveller, the playful kids at Naic rushed into the cavernous confines of the van, and in no time at all, 27 kids were able to squeeze themselves in.

 

All in all, the Foton View Traveller was able to carry delectable vegan food fare for up to 400 kids and adults in just a span of three days. And as many minds were opened to the compassionate, planet-friendly world of veganism.

 

True, ginormous vans like that of the Foton View Traveller can carry the most number of warm bodies, but the spaces inside these vehicles can impact much, much more lives outside.

 

One just has to slide open the door, and let the good vibes in, and the big heart out.

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