Discovering Falun Gong Amidst the Persecution -- Learning the Exercises in Prison

(Clearwisdom.net) In 2002 I became acquainted with one of the department heads in my company while I was working as a saleswoman. It wasn't until much later that I discovered that he was a Falun Gong practitioner. As a saleswoman, I needed to have a good knowledge of our products, so I often talked to him to discuss questions about the products. During our conversations, I was impressed by his moral character and kindhearted disposition. After a while we became good friends, and he started inviting me to his home. When I saw Zhuan Falun (the main book of Falun Gong) in his home, I knew that my friend was a Falun Gong practitioner. At the time, I had become disillusioned with many things in the world and interested in finding the guidance of a genuine cultivation school. After I borrowed Zhuan Falun from him and read the book twice, I decided that this must be the meditation practice that I had been seeking for years. Jiang Zemin had just started to ban Falun Gong and Falun Gong books at the time, so I was unable to obtain a copy of Zhuan Falun from any bookstore. If not for the persecution, I would surely have been able to purchase a copy of Zhuan Falun from any bookstore. Unfortunately, when I learned about Falun Gong I didn't have the good fortune to obtain my own copy of Zhuan Falun. Furthermore, the Public Security Bureau was systematically confiscating Falun Dafa books everywhere.

Back then I didn't know how to react to the persecution, because I never had the opportunity to attend group meditation and experience sharing, I hadn't even learned the exercises yet. Thus I hadn't the slightest idea of what clarifying the truth meant. I continued my life as a saleswoman as usual and cultivated my xinxing alone.

On December 19, 2000, one of my clients called and wanted to meet with me. When I arrived at the building for the appointment, I walked by a room and found a lot of people gathered together. I found that these people were practitioners and they were having an experience-sharing conference. The peaceful and serene atmosphere in the room was very appealing to me, so I decided to attend the conference for a short while and listen to their speeches. Soon afterward, shouting interrupted the conference, "Freeze!" followed by a large number of police officers swarming into the building. They took everyone away with excessive force. I was abducted too. I felt very confused why the police officers acted so viciously. My previous impression was that the police are righteous and respectful. Now that I have directly encountered the reality of Chinese policemen, I've realized that some of them are actually depraved people simply wearing police uniforms.

I later learned that secret agents had followed practitioners into the conference and sold the information to the police. I saw 20 to 30 policemen guarding the stairway, hallway, and outside the building. There were also a lot of police cars outside the building. They brought all of the Dafa practitioners to the Public Security Bureau for interrogation.

Six practitioners and I were stuffed into a police vehicle and hauled to a local police station. On the way there, I asked the practitioners, whom I had never met before, "What is the Public Security Bureau arresting us for?" One of the Dafa practitioners in her 30's said, "Jiang Zemin is staying in this city for two days. The Public Security Bureau wants to kiss up to Jiang, so they are arresting us so as to improve their credentials."

The policemen took turns interrogating each of us. When it was my turn, I did not answer any of their questions, nor did I admit that I belonged to the so-called Falun Gong "organization." When the policemen saw that they couldn't obtain any response from me, they said, "If you admit that you are a Falun Gong practitioner, we will release you immediately." Still, I did not answer. In my heart I scoffed at his deceitful offer. Since the policemen could not get anything from the interrogation, they transferred us to another police station. Late that night, a policewoman in her 20's was very adamant in forcing me to admit that I practiced Falun Gong, but I refused to admit it. Then four to five policemen joined her in the interrogation. They hammered the table with their fists, barked and cursed in order to intimidate me and force me to "confess". Then all of a sudden, I realized that I was a Falun Gong cultivator. I turned to the policewomen and said, "Thank you for the reminder, otherwise I would never have realized it! I am a Falun Gong practitioner!"

On December 21, 2000, I was transferred again to another police station. During the entire ordeal, I was denied my right to make a phone call, or to have any contact with the outside world. I was completely isolated from the outside world. On December 22, 2000, a police officer asked some other policemen to handcuff me, and they took me into a police car. Seven policemen came with us. They did not tell me where they were taking me, but I felt very peaceful and serene, and was not afraid at all. At the time, nothing was on my mind except two lines from one of Teacher's poems:

It turned out that they handcuffed me because they were taking me to the company I worked for, and they planned to search my cubicle. When they tried to read the content of a floppy disk, nothing but garbled codes appeared on the computer screen. I knew that it contained nothing but a sales plan. Apparently these police officers were not even entitled to read my sales plan. They were very frustrated when they could not find any evidence against me. Furthermore, my colleagues told them, "You must have made a mistake. Ms. Liu is a wonderful woman and an excellent salesperson!" Seeing the whole situation was at their disadvantage, the embarrassed police officers began to slander my reputation in front of my colleagues. But when I began to defend myself, the police fell silent, unable to find any facts supporting the empty accusations. I repeated what I had told them in the police car, "I have the right to remain silent! I will talk if you can find any evidence against me!" Their original ferocity had been completely deflated. We left my company empty-handed. Next they took me to my home, but still they could not find any evidence against me. As the police officers became increasingly disappointed, I became increasingly calm and peaceful. In the end, they put me into detention for 15 days with the fabricated charge of "violating social order." After 15 days, they continued to detain me with the excuse of "criminal investigation." While I had not violated any laws, these police officers had violated dozens of laws in just this brief period of time. Even though they had never been able to find any evidence against me, they still transferred me to the city's detention center. There, I ran into a fellow Falun Gong practitioner, and officially started to learn the Falun Gong exercises.

During the illegal detention, I was completely isolated from the outside world, and lost contact with everyone I knew. The disciplinary staff at the detention center openly declared, "Everyone, except Falun Gong practitioners, is entitled to hire an attorney." During the period of time, I was locked in the same cell with one Falun Gong practitioner after another, four of them in total. Because of the opportunity of being in the same cell with fellow practitioners, I slowly learned more about the profound meanings of Falun Dafa. Not only me but also, the prison inmates in my cell, who were detained for stealing, drug dealing, gambling, prostitution, etc., gradually learned that Falun Gong practitioners were people of high morality. Some of them even started to learn and practice the Falun Gong exercises with us. One of the drug-addicts was a repeat offender. Because of Falun Gong's energy field, she purged her addiction to drugs in less than seven days. In the beginning he had a tired and withered look to her, but slowly she began to smile a sweet smile and come to life.

Later, the prison guards ordered the disciplinary staff to force me to renounce Falun Gong and repent for practicing Falun Gong in writing, but I solemnly refused. After all, I have never regretted for one second practicing Falun Gong. I declared to the disciplinary guard, "You must bring me home just as you brought me here!" If I were to have taken vengeance against the police officers, it would have meant that I was not a genuine Falun Gong practitioner. If I didn't seek revenge like non-cultivators would have, I felt that I was still truly cultivating.

Truly, I must thank the police officers for allowing me to meet Falun Gong practitioners in the detention center.

Some fellow practitioners were transferred to the forced labor camp to serve 1-2 years of detention after I had been detained for about 2 months. After four months of illegal detention, the police remained unable to force me to renounce Falun Gong, so they released me unconditionally.
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2003/12/23/63099.html

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