Veganism and the mother-daughter relationship – Davina Goh

AS a plant-based lifestyle advocate, any work involves reaching out to Malaysians about the benefits and joys of a plant-based lifestyle, whilst sharing how cheap, accessible, easy and tasteful it can be. 

One of my biggest priorities is to honour everyone’s individual journeys with food, at whatever point they are. I know that deciding to eat differently is often easier said than done. A lot of the time, the act of changing one’s diet does not affect that person alone. I can speak from experience! 

My parents disapproved of my intention to go vegetarian when I was 16 years old. I was forced to eat meat whenever I was with the family. It was well-intended. My folks simply believed that a complete diet had to include meat. 

This was a blessing in disguise, as I spent the next 12 years slowly cutting meat out of my diet, whilst reading and watching everything I could to educate myself on the “what, why and how” of vegetarianism. By the time I decided to go fully vegetarian in 2012, I was mentally, physically and emotionally prepared for this new chapter. 

From then on, learning about vegan lifestyle and what it stood for resonated even more with my life values. Going vegan seemed quite inevitable, and I did so four years later. Throughout this process, working on my relationship with food was the easy part. The hard part was working on my relationship with my mum.

I grew up on home-cooked food. Every evening after school, my siblings and I would be treated to a table full of splendiferous dishes - no less than four! - that we would enjoy with rice. Two meats were often served, normally rotated between fish, chicken, and pork. 

My mother would spend 2-3 hours in the kitchen every day to make sure that the family was well fed with meals made from scratch. Of course she would know all about keeping her kids big and strong. Looking back, it was understandable why my mother balked at the idea of supporting me on any other kind of diet aside from the one she raised me on. 

My years of trying to reduce meat intake was not met without resistance at home. There would be moments that I would turn away from my lunch or dinner momentarily to pet the dog, or grab a glass of water, then return to find an extra, unwelcome piece of meat on my plate. 

I would glare at my mum sitting next to me, pick up the piece and put it back on the main plate saying “I don’t want it!”, with Mummy picking it up and tossing it back onto my plate – “One more won’t kill you!”. There would be meat flying back and forth, like some strange comedy.

After my father left the family, I moved out of the house to find my footing as a person. It was those seven months of being on my own, making my own packed lunches and learning how to cook, that I got a chance to prove not just to Mummy, but to myself, that eating less meat and more vegetables was sustainable for my health and well-being. When I met Mummy for lunch on the weekends, I’d introduce her to the new vegetarian cafes I’d come to know of. I would try and make meals for her, too, which were thankfully met with approval. 

My going vegetarian ended up becoming an easy pill for her to swallow. However, trying to convince Mummy to support me further on my plant-based journey was yet another hurdle. She simply could not wrap her head around me getting enough protein from anything that wasn’t egg. 

Having gotten married and moved out for good, oftentimes I’d visit her for dinner and she’d have ready at the table one of her signature omelettes or steamed egg. I could not bring myself to say no. My requests to not have her make egg-based dishes seemed to be falling on deaf ears. 

In the five years that I’ve been fully plant-based, two amazing things have happened. The first was that Mummy has finally accepted me as a vegan. The second is that she has begun to recreate vegan versions of the food I’ve grown up with. Fried rice, noodle soup, dumplings, pong teh, curry puffs, you name it. She’s even played little games with me, cheekily asking me to take a bite from something new she’s made and to guess the ingredients she’s used in place of animal products. 

To see her taking up the challenge of adapting to new ways of cooking has made me so proud of her. At the same time, she has been expressing pride for me too: telling everyone she knows that I’m a vegan, explaining to waiters what I eat and don’t eat, and coming to almost every public event where I am doing a vegan talk or food workshop.

She doesn’t do all this to support veganism – it was for me. Accepting this has helped me accept her. When we meet we joke around a lot more, hug and respect each other more than ever. It has been a humbling 20 years of discovering the right time and place for battles to be won. 

I love Mummy’s food more than ever. It is now cooked exactly the way I’ve wished them to be when I was a veggie-loving kid. I’m glad I waited this long. Her plates of home-cooked vegan-friendly goodness are a testament to a long journey made not just by me, but also by us as mother and daughter. That to me has been the best part of being a vegan so far.

Happy World Vegan Day!

Davina Goh is a performer and Malaysia’s pioneering Plant-Based Lifestyle Advocate. She is on Instagram @davinadavegan