‘And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile,” croons David Byrne of seminal ’70s band Talking Heads. And if this is where you find yourself, hopefully your car is headed to the Santa Cruz Fairgrounds on Saturday, May 31. Because that is when the third annual VegFest comes to town, celebrating all things vegan.
Did I just hear the brakes of a large automobile screech?
Consider this, besides the fact that David Byrne is vegan: A vegan diet reduces your carbon footprint up to 73%, and that will counter the emissions from your large automobile. Being vegan isn’t just a dietary change, it’s a way of looking at the world.
“We want people who attend VegFest to have vegan donuts and sushi, and understand they are making sustainable choices,” says Helbard Alkhassadeh, cofounder of VegFest. “And it’s not just about climate change. It’s about understanding that human rights and animal rights are just as important. And once you start treating animals, and all species equally, it’s more difficult to hate one another as humans. There’s a lot more to it than just food.”
And for the vegans—and their distant cousins, the vegetarians—VegFest is going to be like winning (there is a reasonable fee) the Golden Ticket to an ethically sourced chocolate factory (some are not). “Everything at the event, including the vendors that are selling arts and crafts, are strictly vegan,” Helbard adds. “So there’s no animal products in any of the food, or any of the products that are being sold. The vendor selling candles sells soy candles, so no bees were used.” I can hear more car brakes screaming.
Same As It Ever Was
Before you judge vegans too quickly, look at some facts and numbers. Cows are not native to North America. In colonial days, the number of cows was several million. Currently, there are 86 million cows in America.
That was the easy part. Now contemplate that up to 99% of scientists say climate change is caused by greenhouse gases, to which cows contribute 14%. If everyone went vegan, we might be able to stop the rapid and exponentially growing effects of climate change.
Going vegan can save the world.
It’s easy to poke fun, but for vegans—who end up being the tofu butt of many jokes—having an entire fairground of tastes and smells that suit their dietary preferences is a rare treat.
Like Wonka himself, Helbard is wildly enthusiastic. “We have one of Santa Cruz’s greatest bands, the Inciters. You’ll think you’re in the 1970s. They call their sound Northern Soul. I call it the best thing I have ever heard. I would get you an interview with them, but they are currently touring Europe,” Helbard says, laughing, before he runs off to the next task.
With a Beautiful Wife
While Helbard runs around promoting this ambitious and very Santa Cruz event, his wife, Camilla Alkhassadeh, is running Little Hill Sanctuary. “Little Hill is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit farmed animal rescue organization on the Central California Coast,” according to the website.
And you might ask yourself, “How can a young couple, with young children, run a giant festival, a rescue farm and a vital organization.”
“Well, I have no social life,” Camilla explains. “I’m really committed to these things. I think that they’re important. I think that there aren’t enough organizations out there that are rescuing these animals from abuse, neglect and slaughter. We believe raising them in an environment of compassion, and feeding them healthy, is the right thing to do.”
Both Helbard and Camilla are clear that, while they try to lead by example, they don’t expect everyone to rescue 100 animals and organize an entire festival. But they would like everyone to do, at least, something.
“You could maybe just talk to someone and let them know that eating plant-based food is not only good for the animals, but for the planet,” Camilla says. “You can do things on a small scale to make a big impact. That’s part of what VegFest is. Just getting people there, and learning about the things that they can do, whether they’re vegan already, or maybe just interested in eating more plant-based foods, they can learn about how that impacts the world around them, and makes the world a better place for all of us.”
Living In a Shotgun Shack
Going vegan isn’t something that only happens in elite upscale, boujee communities. For Camilla, who grew up in Oregon, in an extremely small town that was based around hunting and fishing, it was a profound decision that happened when she was just a child.
“When I was nine years old,” Camilla’s story begins, “I was at my grandma’s house for Thanksgiving, and I looked at the turkey on the table and thought, ‘Wait a minute—that’s an animal.’ And, I made the association. The turkey that we ate used to be alive. I grew up around wild turkeys. I told my family that, ‘I’m just going to eat the potatoes.’ And my family was like, ‘whatever.’”
And for Camilla, that was that. And while that kind of grounding vegan experience may sound foreign to you, it’s a common origin story. Over time Camilla learned more about animal ethics, about the horrors of the slaughterhouses (where there is a 100% turnover rate), and the dairy industry. “It’s really bad. Cows just don’t make milk. They make milk because they’re mothers, not because they’re cows,” Camilla says.
Once in a Lifetime
VegFest will have other forms of entertainment, including vegan comedians. Matt Gubser grew up in the farming community of Salinas. By anyone’s standards, Gubser is a big, handsome zaddy of a dude. Not a person one would look at and think “vegan.” Six-foot-four and 260 pounds, Gubser is a vital force, and his decision to go vegan was originally based on health. “There’s a lot of heart disease in my family,” Gubser says from his home in the Bay Area. “The men started having heart problems in their late 40s. All of them. So I went vegetarian when I was 21. My grandfather died a year later. and I found out more about his health history. I knew that he had a bypass, but then found out that he also had four silent heart attacks during his life.”
That was the moment that Gubser gave up dairy and eggs. “And it was originally for heart health, but, over time, it became an ethical choice to stop the unnecessary suffering of animals and the destruction of the environment,” Gubser says.
First and foremost, Gubser is a comedian; he has organically grown his concepts of what vegan comedy is onstage. “My go-to was, ‘I’m vegan, I know you can’t tell, because I look like a man,” Gubser laughs. “But the more important idea is that veganism is often competing with identity politics.”
The demographics of the vegan population skew female, Gubser says. “Currently, 79% of women are vegan, versus 21% men, and so, veganism has been gendered as a feminine thing,” he explains. “It goes back to a time when a sign of strength was that you killed your dinner with your bare hands. There’s no real vegan equivalent to defeating an enemy in battle. Maybe getting a scar from a blackberry bush?
“Twenty-five percent of American men eat 50% of all of the beef consumed in America. And their main reason is to appear masculine,” Gubser continues. “It’s a really fragile idea of what masculinity is. In general, people think veganism is an attack not only on their diet, but on the way they look at the world.”
This Is Not My Large Automobile
How does VegFest, which espouses a cleaner environment, offset the amount of cars coming to the event? Last year thousands came; this year upwards of ten thousand are expected. One way is that anyone who arrives with three or more people in the car parks for free. Bring your friends, and family.
And with VegFest right around the corner, Helbard, the tireless promoter, is in a higher gear than usual. “We’re going to have a fleet of vegan food trucks, over a hundred exhibitors, and the beer, wine and cider is vegan. There’s an entire area for kids, with bounce houses and vegan face painting. We even have a kid mariachi band, and I haven’t got their name from their manager, because he’s in the first grade,” Helbard laughs.
VegFest takes place on Saturday, May 31 from 11am until 6pm. Located at the Santa Cruz County Fairgrounds, 2601 E. Lake Avenue, Watsonville. Tickets: $5 adv/$10 door; children under 12 get in for free. More information at vegfestsantacruz.org.
Excellent piece, obliged.