Three thousand people descended on rural Spanish Fork on Saturday afternoon for belly dancing, a vegetarian buffet, bonfire and ritual witch burning capped with a colored powder fight, chanting, singing and moshing.

The term "cocina vegetariana," or vegetarian cuisine, tends to draw blank stares or outright pity from Argentines on the streets of this city, considered by many the red meat capital of the world. But vegetarians need not write Buenos Aires off as a travel destination. Krishna Veggie Lunch is a lively two-room restaurant that serves vegetarian food all day. It is adorned with icons, shrines, paintings, and murals depicting all faiths. It also has a disco ball hanging from the ceiling and a soundtrack that ranges from OutKast to Bob Dylan to Indian dub.

here has never been a better time for environmentalists to become vegetarians. Evidence of the environmental impacts of a meat-based diet is piling up at the same time its health effects are becoming better known. Meanwhile, full-scale industrialized factory farming-which allows diseases to spread quickly as animals are raised in close confinement-has given rise to recent, highly publicized epidemics of meat-borne illnesses. At presstime, the first discovery of mad cow disease in a Tokyo suburb caused beef prices to plummet in Japan and many people to stop eating meat.