Falun Gong Adds Brightness to Sydney's Apple Festival (Photos)
By Dafa practitioners in Australia
(Clearwisdom.net October 22) On October 18, 2003, the Granny Smith
Festival was held in Eastwood, Sydney. It is the largest festival in North
Sydney. Last year, Australia Prime Minister John Howard held an opening ceremony
for this festival and attracted more than 60,000 people. The scale this year is
grander than last year. It is to remember Ms. Granny Smith and her husband, who
made great contributions to the community as the earliest immigrants. As early
as 177 years ago, the Granny Smith couple emigrated from Europe with their
agricultural technique. They bought a farm of about 24 acres in today's
Eastwood, and grew a variety of fruits. The apples they cultivated are still
people's favorite, so the festival is called the Apple Festival.
Taking this opportunity, together with many Western practitioners, we introduced Dafa and clarified the truth. The Falun Dafa procession won warm praise from spectators. The procession was grand and solemn. Two tall Western practitioners led the procession, holding a Falun Dafa banner with golden words in a blue background that was dazzling in the sunshine. Following them was a group of practitioners in Tang Dynasty costumes, and then the Fan Dance group. Practitioners in pink shirts holding rose fans danced to the beautiful music of "Falun Dafa is Great." Behind them was the group of drummers in golden yellow traditional suits. Their drum performance brought people to the traditional festival atmosphere in northwest China. Last in the procession was the floral float, on which Western practitioners and children sat on the handmade lotuses symbolizing purity and demonstrated the exercises. They attracted attention from the audience, especially the Chinese audience. They were amazed and one Chinese person said, "Look, these beautiful Westerners also practice Falun Gong."
When the Falun Gong procession passed by the main stage, the host of the Apple Festival introduced to the spectators, "Falun Gong is a traditional Chinese qigong cultivation group, following the principle of 'Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.' They offer free exercises instruction. If anyone wants to learn, please come to their booth."
Some children sitting on the float repeatedly waved to the crowds of people who waved back to greet them. We indeed felt that the environment was quite different from the previous two years.
That day, a local newspaper reporter told one of our practitioners that our float left a deep impression on people. Many people came to our booth to tell us that our procession was beautiful. The practitioner told the reporter that from activities we participated in over the past four years, we have learned a lot from other groups, so we kept making improvements. We hope that we could play a good role of bridging Eastern and Western culture and introduce the treasure of Eastern culture--Falun Gong to the Western society, so that many people could benefit from it.
We distributed a large number of truth-clarifying flyers that day. Many people came to our booth to sign their names to rescue those relatives of Australian citizens who suffer persecution for practicing Falun Gong. Early in the morning while we were arranging the booth, one Western woman saw our display board for collecting signatures and walked up to sign her name. She said, "Thank you for giving me this opportunity to help those persecuted Falun Gong practitioners in China." We were all moved by her words.
The activity demonstrated the coordination and cooperation of Western and Chinese practitioners. Regardless of whether holding banners in parade or demonstrating the exercises on the float, everybody happily cooperated with each other. Some practitioners drove more than one and a half hours to participate in this Fa-promotion activity.
Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2003/10/22/59305.html
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