By Devlyn Perugini
VRG Intern
On June 27th to 29th, The Humane Society of The United States presented Taking Action for Animals at Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington D.C. About seventy vendors participated in the exhibit hall including The Big Cat Rescue, Compassion Over Killing, Farm Sanctuary, Mercy For Animals, Vegan Outreach, The Humane League, and The Vegetarian Resource Group.
Interns Devlyn and Karen patiently awaiting the arrival of TAFA attendees .
VRG college interns Karen and I, volunteer Matt, and staff member Nina ran The Vegetarian Resource Group booth. We were able to answer questions and distribute vegan information. Karen talked to a woman who is interested in starting a vegetarian outreach organization in Georgia and South Carolina. She asked for information to get started. I noticed that we had several compliments from booth visitors saying, ‘Thank you for being here!’ It was very rewarding to see how many people appreciated our work. Matt (a vegan nurse) was happy to be able to talk to booth visitors and enjoyed connecting with them. Nina was eager to answer questions and was very encouraging. She helped booth visitors feel more comfortable with a vegan lifestyle. A lot of people inquired about vegan restaurants and traveling as a vegan. We were able to refer them to our website for the restaurant guide. (See: http://www.vrg.org/restaurant/index.php)
TAFA was great because we were able to reach and help a lot of people (many of whom were not vegetarian) and were able to connect with other organizations.