(Clearwisdom.net) I started practicing Falun Gong in 1996. It has been over ten years that I have been stumbling along my cultivation path. Prior to practicing Falun Gong, I had Hepatitis B, which I contracted after a blood transfusion during a cesarean section. One hundred days after my twins were born I was readmitted to the hospital. The hospital denied that their blood was contaminated. My husband and I couldn't afford to file a lawsuit. Curing my disease was of priority. I was exhausted physically and mentally. I was introduced to Falun Gong. But, I was not truly committed at that time. I only read the book Zhuan Falun once and rarely practiced the exercises because I was busy looking after the infants. Yet, I knew that I would have not lived to this day without Dafa.
I loved the environment of the group practice and Fa study. There was a Fa study site near my home. I took every opportunity to join the group study. When my children got a little older and could play by themselves, I then went with my husband and my children. Many fellow practitioners knew that I was the mother of the twins, but didn't know my name. By the time my children could walk and run Dafa had widely spread in our area. We brought them to the practice site. When we practiced the exercises, they played next to us.
When the persecution against Falun Gong started in 1999, my children were only three years old. My supervisors pressured and threatened me that I would lose my job and be detained if I continued to practice Falun Gong. They knew that the job was very important to me because my husband lost his job and we needed my income to make ends meet. I was very calm. Although I rarely studied the Fa, I understood clearly what Dafa meant to me. However, I didn't yet understand the magnificence of being a Dafa disciple. Consequently, I still held deviated human notions and cunning tactics, playing word games with my supervisors. I made promises not to practice Falun Gong. Thus, I smeared Dafa and left a stain on my cultivation path.
I knew that I did not study the Fa enough and Teacher hinted many times that I should study the Fa more. I then accepted a job that no one was willing to take – watching a remote and empty campus. But for me it was a job that allowed me to work and study the Fa. Every morning, after finishing my assignments, I sat down and copied Zhuan Falun. I didn't have to go home at lunch because my children were at a daycare. I cooked noodles and added some preserved vegetable to my lunch. My supervisor assigned another official to work with me, but he was rarely there. Sometimes when he was there, I talked to him about Falun Gong.
On March 8, 2000, the Party secretary in my work unit asked me and another practitioner to write our understanding of Falun Gong. I submitted my experience, which I called “Life Becomes Eternal in Dafa.”
In the winter of 2000, I was thinking about going to Beijing to appeal for the right to practice Falun Gong. At that time, I read that around eighteen female practitioners at Masanjia Forced Labor Camp in Liaoning Province were stripped of their clothes and thrown into the male prison cells. I was furious. I hesitated about whether I should go to Beijing. After sending righteous thoughts, I felt that I was tall and strong. My husband and I decided to go. My in-laws took our children. Although there were many checkpoints along the way, and we were followed by our local police we arrived safely in Beijing. We didn't have an identification card, but we miraculously were able to check into a hotel. We truly felt the compassion of Teacher. As long as one has righteous thoughts, Teacher arranges everything.
On December 30, 2000, we were arrested at Tiananmen Square. In January of 2010, our local police station took us back to our hometown. My husband was released after being detained for half a year. I was taken to a forced labor camp for two years and tortured. Then, my term was extended two more months.
The fact that practitioners were detained at a rehabilitation center is a humiliation to practitioners. What needs to be rehabilitated? The perpetrators committed such crimes. How are they going to payback their debt?
What kind of vicious site is it? They set Masanjia forced labor camp as their model. I instantly became cautious. To my surprise, soon after we were detained, other practitioners were “transformed” one after another. In addition, they acted grateful for this. I felt that this dimension was filled with evil. The environment was thick and heavy and suffocating. I thought, “My fellow practitioners, could you not even tell evil from good?” At night, I covered myself and cried. I asked myself, “Why? Why?”
“It remains a question of whether they can understand your Dafa itself while they are in the midst of confusion and tribulations.” It involves such an issue, so there will be interference and tests.”(Zhuan Falun)
My confusion was resolved and I was able to face the adversity with righteous thoughts. Later, the situation improved. More and more practitioners became clear-minded. However, the persecutors did not give up. They started the ruthless torture before the “Sixteenth People's Conference.” Because I refused to recite “the warden is good,” I was hung up by handcuffs to the triangle iron shelf in a warehouse around the clock. Every four to five days, they allowed inmates to feed me once so I would not starve to death. While I was hung up, people tried to persuade me. It was excruciatingly painful. The handcuffs hit the iron shelf, making a “Pa” sound. They cut deeply into my flesh. Just when I felt that the physical and mental pain exceeded my ability to endure, Teacher's words flashed into my brain,
“How could you bow to the evil? How could you promise something to the evil?”( “Dafa is Indestructible” from Essentials to Further advancement II)
I immediately felt better, the pain became bearable and I could fall asleep. When they finally let me down, I could not bend my arms and hands and my legs were severely swollen. Then they handcuffed me under the iron shelf in a squat position.
The so-called “sternly attacking technique” started before the Sixteenth People's Conference. They dispatched many guards and took practitioners to the basement. On the concrete floor, they placed rings, iron shelves and steel sticks. Practitioners were stripped to their underwear and socks. Both hands were handcuffed to the floor rings or iron shelf in the position of squatting and both feet were on the steel stick, which were as thick as a finger. All of us were shaved. Our mouths were stuffed with a knot made from a piece of white cloth and tied behind our head. They then sealed it with wide tape. We were force fed once a day. The guards patrolled with electric batons. If a practitioner fell, they shocked him with electric batons. A senior practitioner did not want to squat on the iron shelf. A male guard, looking like a skeleton then put electricity through the iron shelf. Seeing the senior practitioner suffer, this guard laughed hysterically. Another practitioner did not squat on the iron shelf. They put him into a basin filled with water and electrically shocked him. A guard with the surname Yang ordered inmates to pinch practitioners under their armpits and in the groin area until the skin came off. They then put salt on the wounds. It was truly cruel. My hands were handcuffed. It was so painful.
One day, the warden of the labor camp came to check on what was going on. A guard wanted to flatter him, so he used an electric baton to scorch my leg. I said to Teacher in my heart: “Teacher, please don't let them see my fear, not even a little.” I saw the baton calmly and didn't move at all. The warden said, “Look! She looked dumbfounded. Release her handcuffs, tie her with a rope and cover her eyes.” I was forced to half lie and half sit on the reinforced steel, with my hands tied from behind. I don't remember how many days and evenings I was tortured like this.
The guards were crazy. They dragged practitioners who refused to be transformed outside and beat them with electric batons. Miserable screams could be heard from time to time together with the smell of burning flesh. I thought Teacher had told us all things in a practitioner's body were quite powerful and they were all gong and electricity. I believed that the electricity developed in our body must be hundreds and thousands of times more powerful as that in an ordinary person. I decided to use the power to burn down the evil den. I loosened the rope which tied my hands at my back, then removed the tape that covered my eyes and the rope that tied my feet. I stood up slowly. The guard saw me and shouted in surprise. They took me to a commander, who shouted, “She wants to elevate to upper levels. Have her sign the statement first.” They took out a statement, then grabbed my hands and forced me to sign on it. I said, “I don't admit it. It's no use even if you have the signature.” When they heard what I said, they handcuffed me again. I was aware of my thoughts being not righteous enough. Later, I was handcuffed in an isolation cell. Finally those guards told several criminals to grab my hands and force me to write something. I told them that this wouldn't be me signing the document.
I was detained in a cell with an elderly practitioner who was very determined. In order to transform us, the guards used all possible means. They pulled our pants down below our knees and pressed us to the ground. It was mealtime, so the detainees (most were practitioners) were standing in line along the corridor. The evil detainees opened the door and said they would show our lower body parts. At the time I was 34 and that practitioner was 58 years old. The evil action caused a commotion in the corridor. Some were very angry and said, “It's too shocking! It's too evil!” But, evil detainees suggested that the guards take off our clothes and hang us outside the iron windows. It was winter, so it was windy and cold. The water turned into ice when it dropped to the ground. The guard looked at me. I smiled a little and thought, “I am not afraid. If you do that, we will take the opportunity to show your evil actions to neighboring residents so that they can see your true face. In the meanwhile, more confused practitioners would be awakened and come back to Dafa.”
The guards didn't accept the suggestion. But they used more evil means to insult us. They forced us to squat on the finger-thick reinforced steel, wearing only underwear and socks. We were not allowed to close our eyes around the clock. A practitioner who hadn't slept for several days looked as if her eyes were bleeding. However, their means of torture was of no use on me. I was determined to have their evil means lose its functions. I had accepted the persecution through suffering, instead of disintegrating the evil with Buddha divine powers. This was my understanding at the time. I didn't close my eyes for seven consecutive days and nights.
They hit my knees, back, neck and head. They poured a basin of cold water over my head, put ice under my clothes, stuck urine and feces into my mouth and poked my eyes with a broom. I could feel my blood flowing down my back. Gradually I lost any feeling. I didn't know if it's because I was living an illusion or I really saw something, but I talked a lot of nonsense. They shouted, “Are you going to write the statement or not? You may go to sleep after you finish writing it, otherwise we will not allow you to sleep until you die.” I replied intermittently, “You couldn't accomplish your designs even if you tortured me to death.” Later I fell asleep. On the seventh night, they beat me for half an hour. When they felt tired, I was still not awake. Everyone in the building was shocked.
In order to reach their goal, three guards brought a very large black spider and stuck it underneath our clothes. Three practitioners were threatened that way. One practitioner had been doing quite well. She was clear-minded and not confused at all despite the evil persecution. However, she gave in just because of a spider. I knew that this was against her will, but I still felt bad. Later, I heard that she did quite well after she was released from the labor camp.
They used many despicable means to reach their goal. It's their usual trick to shake practitioners' by taking advantage of our affections to family members. They attempted to shake me by taking advantage of my relationship with my parents, parents-in-law, husband and child. They failed.
I was afraid of seeing my mother-in-law kneel down in front of me. I didn't want to leave any excuse to the evil to defame Dafa and persecute people, nor did I want to see the evil reach its goal, so I recited the Fa repeatedly in my heart. I said to myself: I would definitely not allow the evil to reach its goal. Arranged by Teacher, my parents-in-law and child failed to get on the bus in time. They didn't give up. They knew that my husband and I held deep emotions for each other, so they spread rumors, saying “Your husband is now having a love affair with a woman, but you are here insisting on your belief.” I smiled and said, “He is a practitioner. I trust him and believe in Dafa more.”
For almost four months, I didn't sleep on a bed. Most of the time I was forced to squat. The guards were hostile and asked me, “Do you feel pain in your legs?” I said, “You may give it a try. I bet you couldn't hold out for half a day.” I felt that they were determined to transform me or kill me. Sometimes I really felt that I couldn't stand it anymore. I thought of Teacher's Fa.
“Think about it, when you cultivate well few beings in the gigantic cosmos turn bad and few of them get weeded out.”("Touring North America to Teach the Fa")
I was shocked and thought, “If giving up my life would save numerous sentient beings, it's worth it even if I die.”
I often recited Teacher's Fa as follows to encourage and cheer up myself.
“I am rooted in the universe. If anyone can harm you, he or she would be able to harm me. Put simply, that person would be able to harm this universe.”(from Lecture I, Zhuan Falun)
One day I told them, “You want to take away my life? It's not easy at all!”
More than seven years have passed since I was released. All those experiences have gone with the wind. I don't want to remember them unless for disclosing their evil ways. After all, for a practitioner, it's not honorable to have been persecuted. For a period of time after I was released from the labor camp, I often mentioned my experience of being tortured. My husband reminded me, “Do you think it's honorable to have been persecuted as a practitioner? It's humiliating.”
Of course I am not saying it's humiliating to have been persecuted, but rather, as a disciple, the foremost title and the most magnificent being in the cosmos, we are doing the most righteous and greatest thing in the universe, how could we be persecuted by the evil? We are the heroes on this grand page of history.
Suffering persecution means acknowledging the arrangements made by the old forces. My experience in the labor camp was actually that of protesting the arrangements made by the old forces. I was so passive and in despair. I totally forgot my title as a practitioner of the Fa-rectification period.
Teacher endowed us with everything. However, we lacked confidence and righteous thoughts. Actually it's because we lacked firm belief in Teacher and Fa; we lacked belief in ourselves as practitioners in the Fa-rectification period. Take me as an example. I had already read Teacher's article “Dafa Disciples’ Righteous Thoughts Are Powerful” when I was persecuted. But when I encountered the persecution, I was not steady and held doubt about my righteous thoughts. As a result, my innate abilities couldn't take effect, or take full effect.
