A Practitioner's Journey of Fa-Rectification (Part 1)

(Clearwisdom.net)

I am from a village in Liaoning Province. In October 1995, I fortunately attained Dafa. Since Dafa was persecuted in 1999, I have been illegally detained 6 times. I also went to Beijing to appeal 3 times. My first trip to Beijing was on October 25, 1999. I went to the Beijing Appeals Bureau to appeal, and the police arrested me and sent me back to Linghai for detention. At that time, all of us practitioners in Linghai went on a hunger strike. On the fifth day, we were all unconditionally released. On the second trip to Beijing, I was arrested even before I reached Beijing. I was put into a custodial center and later released. My third trip to Beijing was during the 1999 Chinese Spring Festival. During the Chinese New Year's eve, we went to Tiananmen Square to validate the Fa and were arrested there. Both the military policemen and policemen violently beat the practitioners. They kicked the practitioners and also beat them with electric batons and clubs. The beating made me lose consciousness in the middle of Tiananmen Square. After I regained consciousness, the policemen wanted to lift me up into a police vehicle. I firmly resisted and held the door with my hands. No matter how the policemen, who were behind me, violently kicked, hit, and pushed me, they could not get me inside the vehicle. So they had no choice but to lay me down. I simply crossed my legs and started practicing the meditation exercise. Finally, more policemen came over and lifted me up into the vehicle. I was then sent to Qianmen Police Department. I was detained there for one day and one night and given no food or water. Whenever I studied the Fa or practiced the exercises, the military policemen would beat me with a bench leg. The policemen there were extremely vicious and brutal, and many practitioners were beaten badly.

After the local policemen escorted me back, I was put into the detention center. On the first day after I was sent there, the policemen in the Criminal Investigation Department beat me badly, claiming that I had organized this appeal. No matter how badly they beat me, I refused to say even a word. On the second day, three policemen from my local police department came. Among them was a political instructor with the surname of Jin, who was the leader, a policeman with the surname of Qin, and one more person. They were all very vicious, and they beat me until I lost consciousness. On the third day, I could not even walk. They had somebody put me into a room where they ordered me to kneel. I said I would not kneel to him and I only kneel to my Master. Hearing this, three policemen pushed me down to the floor and tried to force me to kneel. I resisted. In the end, they pushed me down flat on the floor with my face down. One person stepped on my waist, and the other four people beat me. One hit me on my thighs with a shovel handle. Two of them stood separately on my two thighs. One used a cigarette to burn my neck. Still, another hit my head with a wooden stick and pierced my head with a needle. None of them stayed idle, and they were extremely vicious. At that moment, I remembered what Teacher told us, "When it's difficult to endure, you can endure it. When it's impossible to do, you can do it." (Zhuan Falun) It was really painful, but I was determined not give in. After they tortured me this way for over 10 minutes, one policeman came to check my facial expression. I pretended not to feel any pain at all. Right at that moment, I no longer felt any pain in my legs, although I could still hear the sound of the falling stick that hit me. The policemen were still beating me, but I did not feel any pain. I thought that it must be Master who bore the pain for me. I could not prevent my tears from coming down. What a great and benevolent Master! After beating me for half an hour, they stopped. They then stepped onto my legs and stomped my wounded areas. It was so hard to endure. It was so painful, but I thought that I had to endure it. After the villains stopped and stepped down from my wounded areas, they resumed the beating. They beat me on the wounded areas, and I felt more pain than before. They continued to increase the magnitude of the pain they inflicted on me. However, I thought that I have the support of Dafa and Master, and I feared nothing since Dafa is supernormal. I remembered that Master once said, "As long as you practice cultivation, I'm actually right by your side. And as long as you practice cultivation, I can be responsible for you all the way to the end; what's more, I'm looking after you every single moment" (Falun Buddha Fa Lectures in the United States). I thought what I would endure was only a tiny portion, which was nothing. So my righteous thoughts became even firmer. I told them, "You should not treat me like this." They ignored my words. Seeing that the beating did not work, they took off my shoes and pulled off my socks. A policeman took out a pocket knife and used it to scrape the underside of my feet. It was very painful. However, with Master and Dafa in my heart, I can endure any suffering, so I just endured. Another policeman burned my neck with a cigarette. He also pierced my head with a needle, and hit my head with a wooden stick. It was really painful. They beat every place on my body, but I still did not say even a word. After they beat me for over an hour, the leader said, "Let's change our method." They then held me up. I could not control my legs at all, and they felt as if they were not mine. I no longer felt any pain when they hit me on the legs. My legs became swollen. They handcuffed my hands from behind my back and lifted up my clothes. One policeman took out a screwdriver and another took out a cigarette lighter. They then scraped my rib area. I heard they called this torture "rolling on the ribs," which is extremely painful. They wanted to see if I could endure it. I thought I could endure anything, because I have Dafa with me. The scraping, which made noises, caused me great pain. But I did not want to show any painful expressions in front of them, so I did not look at them. After about 20 minutes, one of the policemen said, "Ok, let's stop here! Let's see whether or not you will go to Beijing again. If we had not taken care of you this way, you would go there again." After the torture, my two legs could not walk at all; it was as if they were not mine. Finally, two prisoners carried me into a police vehicle, and I was sent to the detention center.

After I was sent to the detention center, a guard asked, "What happened?" I replied, "It does not matter, and I will recover after several days." Seeing that I had been beaten so badly, this policeman picked a friendlier cell for me. He said that this No. 10 cell was a model one, where nobody would beat or pour cold water on me. After I got inside, the leading prisoner asked me what crimes had caused me to be beaten so badly. I said I had violated no laws. I was brought here because I went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. He said, "Even a murderer like me has not been tortured so badly." A robber also said, "They have not beaten me so badly for my robbery. Why did they beat you, a person who practices Falun Gong, so badly?" I only smiled and did not say anything. Finally, the leading prisoner said to me, "Let me tell you that you are not allowed to practice here. I am the person in charge of this cell." I said, "I will practice no matter where I go." He said that what I said would not work in his room. I said, "Let's try it out." Finally, when I was practicing the exercises, the guards kicked the door, which made the prisoner leader not sleep well. He ordered all the inmates in the cell to beat me. The kicking awakened people in the cell, in neighboring cells, and even in other cells along the hallway. So the prisoner leader thought that I intentionally did not want him to sleep. He picked up a shoe and hit me hard on my face. I just sat there and did not move at all. No matter how hard he hit me, I just did not move. After he hit me three times, he stopped before hitting me for the fourth time and said, "Ok! You go ahead practice! I will not beat you anymore. Let the guard kick the door if he wants. You and I have had no hatred toward each other. You Falun Gong are not a bad person. I feel bad to beat you. You will practice no matter how badly I beat you. You even dared to go to Beijing. Didn't you come here because of practicing Falun Gong? So you just practice your exercises for me. From now on, you practice here for me and you are not allowed to stop practicing! I am in charge of this room. Let the guard kick the door if he is not afraid of hurting his feet." Since then, nobody bothered me when I practiced the exercises. The prisoner leader even praised me. He believes that it is right for one to firmly hold one's belief to the end if one really believes in it, and one should keep going steadily along one's chosen path.

As a result, the guard had no choice but to handcuff me to a window or a door. Each time I would be handcuffed this way for half a night. The people in my cell were concerned about me and tried to lobby the guard for me. They were quite moved. I told them how good Dafa is, how supernormal Dafa is, and how Dafa makes a bad person become a good one. I promoted Dafa to them. As a result, three prisoners in my cell wanted to learn the exercises from me, so I taught them the exercises. I have changed their mentalities. One of them, who was brought there for stealing, said, "Once I get out, I will never steal again. Dafa is so good. If I had known Dafa earlier, I would have not been brought here. After I get out, I would not come back here again because of stealing." After 35 or 36 days, my legs became strong enough for me to do the standing exercises. The swelling of my legs also gradually disappeared. I then started to do the standing exercises. However, the Detention Center Director, knowing that I practiced everyday, told me, "If you do the exercises again today, I will put shackles on your feet." I said that I would practice, even if you put shackles on my feet, and I would still practice even if you hang me up. He said, "How could you practice when you are hung up." I said, "I will then practice in my heart. I will practice as long as I can breathe!"

Fifty days after I was detained in the detention center, I was sentenced to 3 years of forced labor and then sent to Jinzhou City Forced Labor Camp.

The labor camp is located in Wangtun of Jinzhou City. On the first day after I was sent there, Team Leader Feng Zibin said, "This is a labor camp, a place where people are forced to work. It does not matter if you have pleaded guilty or not, or if you have violated the law or not. Once you come here, you should obey our orders. Practicing Falun Gong is not allowed here." Once he finished the statement, he asked, "Anyone who wants to practice today, raise your hand." I thus raised my hand and said, "I will practice." As a result, they let three people watch me that night. Whenever I got up, they would hold me down. So I was not able to practice that night. Next morning, I was sent to No.1 Team in Nanshan of Jinzhou City. A practitioner called Zhang Baoshi was also sent there with me. After arriving at No.1 Team, we found another practitioner named Liang Gang. After getting there, we were asked to dig ditches for dirty water to run through, and we worked for two days. I know how to do masonry work, so I was called to build a water-collecting reservoir. The team leader praised me for my good work. After finishing work the next day, I told my two fellow practitioners, "I will quit working tomorrow." They asked why. I said, "I should not do the forced labor since I have violated no law. We do not come here to work. Today the team leader's praising our work indicates that we are good people. But we did not come here to be good people. This is not a place where good people should stay. We came here to validate Dafa. What is important is how we validate Dafa."

I remembered that Master once said in Zhuan Falun, "If one can make progress just by suffering physically, I would say that Chinese farmers suffer the most. Shouldn't they all become qigong masters, then? No matter how much you suffer physically, you do not suffer as much as they do, who work both hard and painstakingly in the field everyday under the baking sun. It is not that simple a matter." I started a discussion with the two practitioners. I said, "This is Master's Fa! Every sentence has a guiding role in our cultivation. We should do everything according to Dafa." One night, when I was practicing, they knocked me unconscious. They all became scared. After the team leader came, I told him that they beat me. The leader did not care and said, "Beat you because you had practiced?" I asked, "Does a person who practices deserve beating? Is it correct that the labor camp forbids beating people?" They said that I got beaten because I did not follow instructions. I felt that in this special environment, their warped notions have become so strong that they did not listen to any reasoning. They only believed in violence.

Another time, when we were practicing the exercises, our supervisor beat us with a wooden board from a bed. After that, he wrapped my head in the middle of a quilt and left my feet exposed. He then used an electric baton to shock the soles of my feet. Since my head was tightly wrapped in the quilt, I could hardly breathe. After half an hour, I felt dizzy and lost consciousness. I do not know how long they had beaten me. When I regained consciousness, the quilt was already taken away. One of them asked if I would practice tonight. I said I would. He then hit my face with his fist. After he hit me heavily about dozen times, blood came out from my mouth, my face became swollen, and my teeth were loose. I said, "You get no benefit by beating people, you will lose your De (virtue)." He said again, "If you practice again tonight, I will fry you in a pan." He also told all the people in the room, "I will beat whoever sees him practicing but does not stop him."

That night I got up to practice at about 3 a.m., and I practiced the standing exercises first. At that time, a guard came over. Once after he opened the door, he immediately closed it and left. Another person was about to go to bathroom, and when he saw me practicing, he immediately went back to sleep. After I finished the standing exercises, I began meditating. Later, they wanted to punish me because I persisted in practicing. They wanted to force me to stand, squat or bend over but I refused to follow any of their orders. No matter what they said, I did not follow their orders. I said, "Practicing or not is my business, while allowing me to practice or not is your business." In the 4 days after I was sent to No.1 Team, I was beaten 7 times. One day, they carried me in a vehicle to Wangtun to watch a video. When I noticed that the words used in the video were not from Dafa practitioners, I closed my eyes and stopped watching. I then started practicing the exercises. They also videotaped us practicing. The team leader pulled me twice, and I did not move. On the third time, he said, "You come outside for a moment." He brought me to an office and said, "If you want to practice, you can do it here in this room." At noon, they sent me back to my team, when all the prisoners were digging a ditch. After I arrived there, I still refused to work. A bit later, it was lunchtime. After lunch, I started to practice again, when the team leader was halfway through his lunch. When I started to practice the second set of the exercises, holding the Law Wheel, he asked a squad leader to drag me to see him. He asked, "Can't you stop practicing?" I said no. He said, "The work will start soon, so stop practicing." I said, "I do not come here to work. I come here to practice. If you do not want me to practice, I will not do any work."

(The whole article will be posted in continuing parts for 5 consecutive days.)

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