Ten Thousand Things
Multicultural Webfinds

"Ten Thousand Things" is a Buddhist expression representing the dynamic interconnection and simultaneous unity and diversity of everything in the universe.

RAGAMALA in Nara, PEACE CAFE in Kyoto, Buddhist Cuisine in Taiwan, Hip Places in Tokyo & NYC – Vegetarianism: the Most Powerful Strategy Against Global Warming

While sightseeing in Nara, I came across a humble, tiny flyer, advertising a Mustard Seeds Indian Handicraft fair trade sale benefiting handcrafters in India, organized by former Kansai resident Maura Hurley. Because of my travel schedule, I couldn't make the sale, but stopped by the restaurant hosting the sale, RAGAMALA, and, near Nara's wonderful five-story pagoda, next to Sarusawa "Set the Living Things Free" pond, I found a vibrant oasis of enlightened cuisine – spicy, pure vegetarian Indian food – and Indian music.

The owner told me that Ragamala (which means a chain or necklace of ragas), seeks to nourish the sense of sound, and that their vegetarian cuisine springs from their concern about healthy cuisine and environmental activism. So here, in Nara, was an outpost of Indian millennia-old vegetarian tradition that springs from the belief in ahimsa, nonviolence towards all living things.

This remark about the nexus between vegetarianism and environmentalism inspired me to do some reading. I knew that the meat industry has contributed in a large measure to the destruction of Amazon rainforests and incredible amounts of pollution, but, until recently, I didn't know that the meat industry is neck-to-neck, if not worse that the oil industry, when it comes to creating global warming.

Just after dialoguing with Ragamala, I read Kathy Freston's powerful article "Vegetarian is the New Prius" detailing the connections between the meat industry and global warming:

"Last year researchers at the University of Chicago took the Prius down a peg when they turned their attention to another gas guzzling consumer purchase. They noted that feeding animals for meat, dairy, and egg production requires growing some ten times as much crops as we'd need if we just ate pasta primavera, faux chicken nuggets, and other plant foods. On top of that, we have to transport the animals to slaughterhouses, slaughter them, refrigerate their carcasses, and distribute their flesh all across the country. Producing a calorie of meat protein means burning more than ten times as much fossil fuels--and spewing more than ten times as much heat-trapping carbon dioxide--as does a calorie of plant protein. The researchers found that, when it's all added up, the average American does more to reduce global warming emissions by going vegetarian than by switching to a Prius.

"According to the UN report, it gets even worse when we include the vast quantities of land needed to give us our steak and pork chops. Animal agriculture takes up an incredible 70% of all agricultural land, and 30% of the total land surface of the planet. As a result, farmed animals are probably the biggest cause of slashing and burning the world's forests. Today, 70% of former Amazon rainforest is used for pastureland, and feed crops cover much of the remainder. These forests serve as "sinks," absorbing carbon dioxide from the air, and burning these forests releases all the stored carbon dioxide, quantities that exceed by far the fossil fuel emission of animal agriculture.

"As if that wasn't bad enough, the real kicker comes when looking at gases besides carbon dioxide--gases like methane and nitrous oxide, enormously effective greenhouse gases with 23 and 296 times the warming power of carbon dioxide, respectively. If carbon dioxide is responsible for about one-half of human-related greenhouse gas warming since the industrial revolution, methane and nitrous oxide are responsible for another one-third. These super-strong gases come primarily from farmed animals' digestive processes, and from their manure. In fact, while animal agriculture accounts for 9% of our carbon dioxide emissions, it emits 37% of our methane, and a whopping 65% of our nitrous oxide.

"It's a little hard to take in when thinking of a small chick hatching from her fragile egg. How can an animal, so seemingly insignificant against the vastness of the earth, give off so much greenhouse gas as to change the global climate? The answer is in their sheer numbers. The United States alone slaughters more than 10 billion land animals every year, all to sustain a meat-ravenous culture that can barely conceive of a time not long ago when "a chicken in every pot" was considered a luxury. Land animals raised for food make up a staggering 20% of the entire land animal biomass of the earth. We are eating our planet to death.

On a hopeful note, Kathy concluded by detailing the movement towards vegetarianism among trendsetters and the "explosion of environmentally friendly foods."

In late 2006, Kaori Shoji wrote on the same trend taking off in Japan, "Tokyo café society goes for a hipper diet: New vegan cuisine lures chic clientele." Restaurants like BROWN RICE CAFE, PURE CAFE, and NATURAL HARMONY ANGORO reflect this shift, which in Japan has connections with the macrobiotic movement that officially began in the 1950's but has traditional Japanese roots that goes back to ancient Eurasian influences. The Tokyo Vegetarian Guide has a list of the many vegetarian restaurants there.

My favorite macrobiotic dream destination in Tokyo is a little restaurant in Kugayama named TAO (on the Inokashira line). It is a small wooden space, with photographs of the Aurora borealis on the walls. The vibe is so slow and calming and their natto is out-of-this-world, I really think the aura of Tao penetrates throughout Kugayama and beyond, along the Inokashira line, up to Kichijoji, which has some great vegetarian restaurants as well.

CAFE PEACE, in Kyoto, one of the largest vegan restaurants in Japan, has a tip jar, not for the wait staff, but for an animal shelter. According to Kyotophile Nils Ferry, owner, Rumiko Suzuki, deliberately opened the restaurant above two beef restaurants to make a statement.

Of course, Kyoto is the world's capital of Zen Buddhist cuisine. Chinese and Korean monks first introduced Buddhist vegetarian cuisine, SHOJIN RYORI, into Japan. KJ's John Einarsen told me about the FUCHA RYORI restaurant at Mampukuji, an Obaku Ming Dynasty era Zen temple in Uji, near Kyoto. (Fucha Ryori is also served at Kofukuji temple in Nagasaki). I didn't have enough time during my visit at Mampukuji to try it, but I did enjoy a Shojin Ryori lunch at Daitokuji temple's restaurant, IZUSEN. <. I also ate at at many of the dozens of tofu (including my favorite tofu variation, YUBA) restaurants throughout Kyoto, a vegetarian paradise.

Cheryl Chow, a journalist based in Taipei, told me that Taiwan has hundreds of Buddhist vegetarian restaurants. Her favorites are Kuan Shih Yin (29 Minchuan E. Rd., Sec. 2) and Fa Hua (132 Minchuan E. Rd., Sec. 3). Paula McEachern writes that they represent a continuity of ancient values:

"Most of these eateries are easily recognized by the backwards swastika that adorns Buddhist establishments in Taiwan. In fact, vegetarian restaurants are so prevalent that Taipei residents and guests can easily satisfy a craving for vegetable edibles in virtually any part of the city.

"For some people in the West, the word "vegetarian" may still evoke images of California hippies and passing fads. For Chinese people, however, vege-tarianism is viewed in terms of its long and venerable history, which is rooted in the ancient philosophical and religious beliefs of Taoism and Buddhism.

"As early as the sixth century B.C., Taoist theory encouraged people to seek harmony with nature by leading a simple, balanced life, sustained by a predominately vegetarian diet. Buddhist teachings, which reached China in the first century B.C., reinforced much of the Taoist worldview, including its preference for the vegetarian regimen. In particular, the Buddhist code of ahimsa (non-injury) prohibited Buddhists from killing living creatures for food."


I'm getting ready to go to New York City and my first stop will be at an old favorite, ZEN PALATE, a stylish restaurant that seeks to inspire enlightenment through delicious fusion vegetarian cuisine. Buddhist New Yorkers opened the first Zen Palate in 1990, then opened a three-story restaurant overlooking Union Square. Their website has podcasts of their lecture series, including global warming expert Noam Mohr's "Vegetarianism – The Most Effective Strategy Against Global Warming In Our Lifetime." I'm also going to HANGAWI, "a vegetarian shrine in another time and place," a Korean restaurant that infuses a spiritual atmosphere into its cuisine, CHENNAI GARDEN, a midtown kosher South Indian restaurant opened by Leah Kahalani, whose father was a Jewish Indian raised in Mumbai, and to CARAVAN OF DREAMS, a kosher raw restaurant that evokes the Silk Road....

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