Kechara Oasis first opened in 2009. Led by Irene Lim, my long-time student, she has since been taking the restaurant to greater heights. Just a month ago, they won the Top 10 Best Casual Dining Award at the HAPA Awards (Hospitality Asia Platinum Award)! Held on an annual basis, the award recognizes top restaurants around Malaysia. Within a year, Kechara Oasis has been able to top long-time restaurants including those in hotels! Even more amazing is that it was the only vegetarian restaurant that was competing.

Having a vegetarian restaurant in Malaysia is interesting. Most customers are new-age professionals, older people or families…

Many Chinese (including those in Malaysia) have some specific days within the year where they are vegetarian…Kuan Yin’s (Chenrezig) birthday, 1st and 15th day of the Chinese calendar, 8 Emperor’s God day etc. Chinese believe that the first meal of the Chinese new year should be vegetarian as it is regarded as bad to take a life as the first action in the new year. But now being vegetarian is not a Chinese thing but a health and environmentally caring attitude.

There are many religions, or sects within a religion, that encourages vegetarianism like Sikhism and Buddhism. There are those that are strictly vegetarian like Jainism. Even within Islam, the beautiful religion that the majority of Malaysians follow, encourages vegetarianism. Here is a beautiful quote I find comforting below:

Al-Qur’an, 6:38
There is not an animal that lives on the Earth, nor a being that flies on its wings, but forms part of communities like you. Nothing have We omitted from the Book, and they all shall be gathered to their Lord in the end.

“Whoever is kind to the creatures of God, is kind to himself.”

–The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), narrated by Abdallah bin `Amru, in Bukhari and Muslim collections.

Bukhari

“The Holy Prophet Muhammad (S) was asked by his companions if kindness to animals was rewarded in the life hereafter. He replied: ‘Yes, there is a meritorious reward for kindness to every living creature’.”

Source: http://www.angelfire.com/stars3/larika0/index1.html

Whenever on the topic of being vegetarian, most people feel that it’s too difficult, too inconvenient or they just don’t know where to eat if they are vegetarian. Well, now they have their answer…Kechara Oasis hehe

Click and watch this nice video…fun too…

Or view the video on the server at:
https://video.tsemtulku.com/videos/KecharaOasisAndQuotes.mp4

The video above was posted up on Facebook, where the person wrote something that I thought was very condensed and concise. I thought I’d share it with all of you:

“A New vegetarian cusine at Jaya One, Petaling Jaya, Malaysia. Kechara Oasis is inspired by H.E. Tsem Rinpoche who wishes to encourage vegetarianism and making vegetarian diet delicious, appealing and readily available to people. Promoting vegetarianism is promoting non-violence through respecting the lives of all living beings thus creating the causes for a larger vision of promoting world peace, beginning in the community of Petaling Jaya, extending to the nation of Malaysia and across the globe.

Address: D19, Block D, Jaya One, 72A, Jalan University, 46200, Petaling Jaya. Entrance is from B1 Carpark.

Tel: +603-7968 1818

www.kechara.com/dining

Length: 2:36”

I respect all religions very much…here are some quotes to share with everyone below. My placing of quotes here is not advocating anything, it is simply quotes to share I found beautiful..thank you.

Tsem Rinpoche

The ideal for most religions is Vegetarianism

Judaism

From the Hebrew Bible

Genesis(1:29)
“Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in that which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for food.”

In Genesis (1:30)
“And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for food; and it was so.”

Isaiah (1.11)
“To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the LORD: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats.”

Isaiah (66:3)
“He that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man.”

Christian

When Jesus spoke of meat he was talking of food Close study of the original Greek manuscripts shows that the vast majority of the words translated as “meat” are trophe, brome, and other words that simply mean “food” or “eating”
St. Luke (8:55)
Jesus raised a woman from the dead and “commanded to give her meat.” The original Greek word translated as “meat” is phago, which means only “to eat.” “Let her eat.”

The Greek word for meat is kreas (“flesh”), and it is never used in connection with Jesus. Nowhere in the New Testament is there any direct reference to Jesus eating meat.

Isiah’s words
“Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good.”

Hinduism and Buddhism

Buddha believed in ahimsa, or non-violence.He advocated a vegetarian life-style.
The Vedic Scriptures of India, which predate Buddhism, also stress nonviolence as the ethical foundation of vegetarianism.

The Manu-samhita, the ancient Indian code of law, states, “Meat can never be obtained without injury to living creatures, and injury to sentient beings is detrimental to the attainment of heavenly bliss; let him therefore shun the use of meat.”

In another section, the Manu-samhita warns, “Having well considered the disgusting origin if flesh and the cruelty of fettering and slaying of corporeal beings, let him entirely abstain from eating flesh.”

More recently the Hare Krishna movement has introduced these ethical considerations around the world. Srila Prabhupada, the movement’s founder-acarya (spiritual master), once stated, “In the Manu-samhita the concept of a life for a life is sanctioned, and it is actually observed throughout the world.

Similarly, there are other laws which state that one cannot even kill an ant without being responsible. Since we cannot create, we have no right to kill any living entity, and therefore man-made laws that distinguish between killing a man and killing an animal are imperfect …

According to the laws of God, killing an animal is as punishable as killing a man. Those who draw distinctions between the two are concocting their own laws.

Emphasizing the Vedic conception of the unity of all life, Srila Prabhupada then stated, “Everyone is God’s creature, although in different bodies or dresses. God is considered the one supreme father. A father may have many children, and some may be intelligent and others not very intelligent, but if an intelligent son tells his father, ‘My brother is not very intelligent; let me kill him,’ will the father agree? … Similarly, if God is the supreme father, why should He sanction the killing of animals who are also His sons?”

Islam

Al-Qur’an, 6:38
There is not an animal that lives on the Earth, nor a being that flies on its wings, but forms part of communities like you. Nothing have We omitted from the Book, and they all shall be gathered to their Lord in the end.

“Whoever is kind to the creatures of God, is kind to himself.”
–The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), narrated by Abdallah bin `Amru, in Bukhari and Muslim collections.
Bukhari

“The Holy Prophet Muhammad (S) was asked by his companions if kindness to animals was rewarded in the life hereafter. He replied: ‘Yes, there is a meritorious reward for kindness to every living creature’.”
The Quran, 6:38

All creatures on earth are sentient beings. “There is not an animal on earth, nor a bird that flies on its wings – but they are communities like you.”

Source: http://www.angelfire.com/stars3/larika0/index1.html
 

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