Gu Linna, Hebei Province

September 1999

During my detention, the people I faced day and night were either policemen or prisoners. When the policemen were angered, they would slam the table and yell loudly to prevent me from sleeping. They said that if I were not a woman, they would slap my face so hard that I would tumble over and over. The prisoners called us practitioners "the newcomers" and would yell insults at us all day. They made me sleep on a wet floor and even had me sleep for two days in a place where the ceiling was leaking muddy water.

I always remembered the teachings of Falun Gong: "Other people can treat us badly, but we cannot be bad to others," and "A benevolent person always keep a heart of mercy and compassion. With no complaints and no hatred, he takes suffering as joy." In this unique environment, as I was defending the righteousness of Falun Dafa and the dignity of a cultivator, I was also trying my best to be a good person. I kept explaining my viewpoints to the policemen who were interrogating me: "You can treat me as a prisoner, interrogate me, and yell at me because from your standpoint, it's your job. But I will never see you as an enemy. I am practicing cultivation in an upright and open manner and always strive to be a good person. I have not done anything that violates the Chinese constitution. Nor do I see myself as a criminal. I can talk to you about the course of my cultivation practice and my experiences. When we talk, you and I are equal." After more than 20 days of this kind of interrogation and communication, I would occasionally overhear them saying: "This person is really not bad. The higher authorities want to punish her, but we won't agree."

When they judged and commented on Teacher and Falun Dafa, my heart felt particularly bad, not only for Teacher and Falun Dafa, but also for them. So I would kindly tell them: "Before, it was always you telling me what to do. I would also like to offer you some sincere advice. Falun Dafa is the Great Law of the Universe. You really have no way of understanding its profound principles. Even if you do not care about the possible eternal impact on yourselves caused by your judgments and comments on Falun Dafa, you should at least be courteous about Falun Dafa and Teacher Li." After I was held for a month, they moved me to a local detention center. When there were kind policemen on duty, they would let me out of my cell to get some fresh air. So I would sweep the yard, water the trees, and wash the cars. Sometimes I would help the chef prepare meals in the kitchen. Some people would joke around and say: "The practitioners that the government depicted on TV don't do any work, they don't take care of their homes, they don't take care of their farms. She doesn't look that way." In one of the pledges that everyone in the detention center had to write for the "Greeting National Day Month" activity, I wrote: "Every year before the National Day, I use my achievements as my gift to the nation. Now I am in prison, but I strongly believe that one can be a good person in any environment, and in this very unique environment of the detention center, I will treat each and every person kindly."

I helped the prisoners who were on duty to mop the floor and scrub the toilets and took over the night shift if the prisoner on duty was ill. During the leisure time, I would tell them my cultivation experiences and the principles of being a good person. There was a girl from the countryside who couldn't read. She was required to memorize and recite the rules of the prison within three days. The person who had been appointed to teach her gave up after only one day: "Supervisor, I can't take it anymore. Let "Zhen, Shan, Ren" (truthfulness, compassion, forbearance, the principle of Falun Dafa) come teach her." Because I would be interrogated during the day, I used the time after lunch and after the evening roll call to go over the rules word by word, but she couldn't remember it even after we had gone over it a hundred times. One day, I became impatient, and at the time, I felt very bad. I am a cultivator, even the prisoners call me "Zhen, Shan, Ren" (truthfulness, compassion, forbearance). Yet on this trivial matter, I had neither compassion nor forbearance; there were so many areas that I had missed in my cultivation. After 20 days, she finally memorized it. She often brought tasty food to me to eat to thank me. I told her: "It doesn't matter so much whether cultivators eat much or not, but food is very important to you, so keep it for yourself." She sighed and said: "I can't imagine that there's such a good person in jail. Falun Gong is so good, how come I had never heard of it before? After I get out of here, I will definitely learn it."

Prior to this, most of the prisoners had never heard of Falun Gong before. Before I was put in there, their conceptions about Falun Gong had all come from the propaganda in the state-run media. After I went there, they saw that I was truly a good person and as I kept telling them the facts about cultivation practice, they went from their initial curiosity to a gradual understanding and found that all the propaganda on TV was false. Then, more than half of them indicated that they wanted to practice Falun Gong. Many people learned meditation from me. It was interesting that most of them were able to cross their legs in the lotus position. Teacher says: "The Fa saves those with a predestined affinity, no matter what they had done before." It was a rare opportunity for them to encounter Falun Dafa. I truly hoped that they would be able to practice cultivation in Falun Dafa. Only Falun Dafa can truly save a person. After me, five more "newcomers" arrived. None of them were bullied. When one of them was on duty, there would be six or seven people helping out. The prisoners had basically stopped insulting people and no longer yelled curses. Shortly before I left, a prisoner pointed at me and said to everyone: "She doesn't insult people. In front of her, I dare not insult people. When I think of insulting others, I blush in shame and then I can't say the words." When we were in class, the girl who sat next to me chatted with me everyday. She said: "People all say that even good people will become bad after they go to jail, but it's here in jail that I've learned to be a good person."