A Kynd Life

Ashkr was raised vegetarian until age seven, when he began eating seafood. He had quite a nomadic upbringing, travelling around Australia while being home schooled, until his family decided to call Melbourne home at age 10. Ashkr always loved cooking and undertook a chef apprenticeship during year 11 and 12 VCAL. During this time, he organised a food stall at a local school and raised money for Se...

Dim Kailaris was raised in a Greek family, with strong ties to culture and traditions including eating meat, dairy and eggs in every meal. He could never understand people being vegan, until seven years ago when he watched Earthlings. Dim saw what happens inside slaughterhouses and went vegetarian. Two months later, he learnt about the egg and dairy industry and went vegan from an ethical standpoi...

Kim is a working mother of three, who studied law and moved into the public service to contribute to her local community. She was born in Vietnam and at age four, Kim and her family set sail on a small fishing boat to Hong Kong in search of a better life. At age 11, Kim and her family were accepted into Australia as refugees and Kim quickly learnt English as a second language. Kim was raised eatin...

Matt Stellino watched in horror, as he saw a 4 Corners exposé on cattle in the live export industry. He looked online for footage that disproved what he had seen, only to find all of it was as horrible as what he had seen the night before and as a result Matt went vegetarian. In 2015, Matt and his partner went to Vegan Day out to learn more about the vegan lifestyle. After reading all of the infor...

Cam Sherry is a 40 year old husband and father of two energetic boys. Cam works in the liquor industry and was a national track and field representative in his younger years. Cam describes his journey to veganism as a slower one, because little seeds were planted along the way. Cam's wife Hannah is a veterinarian and after she spent time with piglets, Hannah declared to Cam that they were no...

Asal grew up in Iran and moved to Australia as a student. The catalyst for Asal becoming vegan was when she saw fur farm footage on PETA's social media. Asal recalls feeling so upset, angry and helpless, she continued her research and decided going vegan was the only way forward.  Asal became active soon after she went vegan, getting involved in local campaigns, however she didn't feel l...

Georgie went vegetarian when she was four years old after witnessing a truck full of innocent pigs being taken to a slaughterhouse. Later in life, during her first year of university, Georgie watched "A Bloody Business" and "Earthlings" and recognised she needed to do more for animals, so she went vegan. Studying Law and Communications at university, Georgie knew she wanted to...

Avalon Todaro is a well regarded vegan tattoo artist in Melbourne. Almost a decade ago, Avalon became aware of the horrors of meat, dairy and eggs from her older sister and became vegan after realising she couldn't support these industries. After following Edgar's Mission for a little while, Avalon saw they needed homes for a large number of rescued battery hens. She was drawn to the opp...

Jack Rock, also known as That Vegan Dad, is a husband and father of two young boys. Jack and his wife decided to go vegan after trying many ways to clear their youngest son's eczema. The family adopted a vegan diet and found great health benefits, but also understand the ethical and environmental aspects of living a vegan lifestyle. Jack is an avid cook, mastering quick and easy vegan meals f...

Nanda grew up in Argentina and once finished at school, he began travelling to experience the world. Nanda was always looking for more from life and began to delve deeper into spirituality. Nanda found meaning in the teachings of Hare Krishna and within a few months of joining his local Temple, Nanda became a Monk at age 21. Around the same time, he watched a video by Gary Yourofsky and recognised...

Andy began his career in the construction industry and trade unions, always being a strong voice when it came to safety concerns and marginalised workers.  During his construction career, Andy worked on a jobsite next to a pig slaughterhouse and could not bear to hear the pigs screaming in the facility.  He recognised the injustice animals face and decided to follow in his wife April's footst...

Angela’s vegan journey is a little bit different to most, she became an activist before she became vegan. After watching “The Cove” Angela attended her first dolphin protest in August 2013 and signed up to her first Sea Shepherd campaign in Taiji as a Cove Guardian. In doing her research for the Taiji campaign, Angela read a book by Captain Paul Watson’ (founder of Sea Shepherd) and decided to go...

In this episode, I welcome back Sam Vas who shared his story in an earlier episode of A Kynd Life. Sam returns to share his knowledge and insights into meditation, having practiced meditation from the early age of five. Meditation has always been part of Sam's daily routine as he believes it's the key to life - we cannot experience life fully without a mind, body and soul connection. In...

Catherine Kelaher recollects trying to save spiders and adoring bottle feeding lambs as a young girl. Catherine wishes she made the connection to animal exploitation earlier, having been a vegetarian that ditched dairy for a number of years. In 2008 Catherine finally aligned her actions with how she felt about animals and went vegan. She was active in animal rights organisations and in 2010, Cathe...

James McLauchlan watched Cowspiracy after it was mentioned by a friend during university study. When James watched the documentary, he recognised what was happening to animals at the hands of humans, did not sit well with him. He proceeded to educate himself and within a few days, James went vegan. James recently graduated from Monash with a Bachelor of Psychology (Honours) and plans to commence h...

Jonathan Sarandis admits that at a younger age, he found veganism difficult to understand and was quite sceptical. After educating himself on how animal products were produced and recognising farm animals weren't dissimilar from his beloved dog, he went vegan overnight. When Jonathan decided to go vegan, he reassessed much of his life, goals and values to make sure he was living in alignment...

Adam Cardilini is a Lecturer of Environmental Science at Deakin University.  Adam's PhD involved studying the evolutionary ecology of a bird species, the non native Common Starling. He began to connect with the birds and struggled to kill the individuals in the name of science. Adam spent time at dairy farms as part of his PhD research and became vegan after witnessing the horrific conditions...

Helen Seta went vegan after overhearing a work colleague talking about bobby calves in the dairy industry. Helen knew being vegan wasn't enough, so she quickly became involved in animal rights activism. Helen is the Oceania Liaison for the Animal Save Movement as well as organiser for Melbourne Chicken Save. Being a graphic designer by trade, Helen recognises the need for the development of e...

Monique Medved and I walked 62km along the Surf Coast to raise money for a Nepalese man Sancha, his family and community who have been hard hit with no income from tourism as a result of COVID19.  In this episode, Mon and I reflect on our thoughts and experiences during this massive physical and mental challenge. We chat about saying yes to experiences outside your comfort zone, not having expecta...

In this episode, I welcome back Deanna Carbone (Kangas), my first guest on A Kynd Life. Deanna, a passionate animal rights activist, returns to share her wisdom on how vegans can get involved in animal rights activism and simple steps on how to conduct effective activism. Deanna provides great insight on how to find activism best suited to you, tips for attending your first event, managing confron...

Monique Medved made a commitment to herself to start a YouTube channel and post one video a week for a year, that's 52 videos to plan, script, edit and publish. The aim of the channel was to show up and do the thing she said she was going to do, it wasn't to gain followers or fame, but to follow through on a commitment to herself. One year on and what an adventure! Mon has been on a jour...

Emma was born and raised in Sydney and recalls a moment in her childhood when she held a hen and realised the hen was no different to her cat. At that moment, she knew she could no longer eat animals. This was just the beginning of Emma's passion for animal protection and she has been campaigning for animals ever since, working with organisations such as Animal Liberation and PETA.  Emma is t...

Mon Tudor's vegan journey began three years ago after a visit to Edgar's Mission. On arrival at the sanctuary, Mon and her husband saw the quote “If we could live happy and healthy lives without harming others, why wouldn't we?” and something clicked. Mon and her husband made the decision to go vegan that evening! Mon's strong connection with Edgar's Mission continues toda...

Brodie was challenged by a mate to try a plant based diet for one month. Brodie loves a challenge and doesn't do anything in halves, so he took on the challenge and started researching how he was going to maintain his physical pursuits while eating plant based. Brodie then looked into the environmental and ethical issues associated with animal agriculture and decided he was going to adopt a v...

Tash Peterson went vegan overnight after watching a documentary "Food Choices" on Netflix four years ago. It was a light bulb moment for Tash and she knew she would be vegan for life. Tash wanted to share the vegan message and became involved with animal rights organisations such as Anonymous for the Voiceless, the Save Movement and Direct Action Everywhere. Following involvement with Di...