(Minghui.org) By chance, a relative told me, “Falun Dafa is really good. Its teachings can’t be found in other books.” I thought that since she had said that this practice was good, I should give it a try.
After listening to Master’s lectures for a few days, the more I listened, the more I liked them, and the more I found the teachings made sense. I thought to myself, “Falun Dafa is great. I started learning so late.” Falun Dafa has been firmly rooted in my heart ever since.
I am strict about always abiding by the principles of Falun Dafa in whatever I do. Be it at work or in the neighborhood, whoever interacts with me will say that I am a good person.
I work in a hotel run by the county government. One year on May 1, the hotel’s rooms were fully booked. It had been many years since this had happened. The manager was elated and personally instructed all the hotel employees to make every effort to take good care of the guests.
Unfortunately, the employees, who were unhappy with some of the unreasonable penalties that the manager had imposed on them in the past (but had never dared to voice their complaints), decided that this was a chance for them to take revenge on the manager. The service employees on my floor colluded and took the next day off. No one came to work, because they wanted to cause trouble for the manager. They knew that I would not do such a thing, so no one told me about it. I went to work as usual the next day.
I used to work at the main desk and was in charge of assigning rooms and taking payment. After the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) initiated the persecution of Falun Dafa, I went to Beijing to appeal for justice for the practice and was illegally detained. When I came back, the manager demoted me to housekeeping. Dafa practitioners should be good people no matter where we go, so I had no complaints about whatever he asked me to do. I just did my job well.
The floor that I work on has more than 100 beds, and four of us are assigned to do the housekeeping. When I went to work the next day, I changed into my uniform as usual and started cleaning the rooms assigned to me. After I finished, I went to the staff room, but no one was there. We usually meet there after we finish our work, so that was strange. I did not make a fuss about it, though, because if the service staff are not where they are supposed to be they would be considered remiss in their duties, and the manager would punish them if she found out about it.
To avoid delaying the guests checking in, I started to clean the others rooms, quietly, one by one, from one side of the hall to the other. Near the end of my shift, I had managed to finish cleaning all of the rooms on my floor. During this time, I did not see the guestroom manager.
The service staff are divided into two shifts, and the next shift needs to be there to take over before the earlier shift can leave. The duty location must be staffed. However, when it came time to leave, the guestroom manager was the only one there to take over. In the past, if anyone did not show up for their shift, the guestroom manager would take over their shift to save expenses. I thus did not think too much of it and just left.
The next day when I went to work, someone secretly told me, “None of the other service staff came to work yesterday. They all took a leave of absence, saying something had happened at home, leaving the guestroom manager in a frenzy. All the rooms were fully booked, but the housekeeping staff wasn’t there, so there was no one to clean the rooms. What if all the guests checked in at the same time? What was she going to do?
“She was so worried that she kept pacing, but she did not dare let anyone know for fear that the main manager would fly into a rage. She was also too embarrassed to ask you for help. She did not know how to tell you when she went up there, so she just did not dare approach you. After you left, when she used her key to open all the rooms, she found that you had cleaned them all. She was elated. She said that people with a belief are different from others. You did her a big favor.”
Six months later, the guestroom manager finally told the main manager about this, and the main manager called a meeting of all the staff. At the meeting, the main manager said, “On May 1 this year, our hotel welcomed a record-breaking number of guests. But on that day, only (my name), a Falun Dafa practitioner, came to work. What is wrong with practicing Falun Dafa? She practices it, and I support her. She went to Beijing, and I was willing to go find her. This is because she is able to achieve what you all cannot.” When I heard that, I was moved and happy because what she agreed with was not me personally but Falun Dafa. Not long after that, she moved me back to handling the main desk.
Agents from the 610 Office in our county called my main manager many times, telling her to send me to a brainwashing center, but she ignored them. Once, a 610 Office employee personally came to the hotel to see the main manager, saying, “We told you to send (my name) to the brainwashing center. Why haven’t you done it?” My main manager said, “I only know that she does what I tell her to, so she is a good employee. I do not care about the rest.” The 610 Office person had no choice but to leave.
I have been held illegally in a detention center, sent to a brainwashing center, and imprisoned many times due to this persecution. These encounters have done great harm to my family and overshadowed my life.
On July 20 one year, the county police department thought that it was a sensitive day, so they came to my office to ask me if I was still practicing and if was I still going to Beijing. I replied, “It is my constitutional right whether I practice or not, and I am free to go to Beijing whenever I chose. Nobody has the right to interfere.” The police took me to the detention center without any explanation and held me for 15 days.
When I returned home, my husband cried and said, “Why are you so silly? Won’t it do to just tell them that you are not practicing?” I said, “Since I have been practicing Falun Dafa, I have put so much effort into looking after you and our child. I also treat your parents and siblings well. I do not have any bad habits, nor do I do anything bad. You tell me, where I have gone wrong?” My husband said, “The police have said that you can now drink, call for prostitutes, or gamble, but you just can’t practice Falun Dafa. It is not a matter of right or wrong, but that you just cannot win against the CCP!”
My husband’s friend came to my office once day to settle some matters. When he saw me, he said, “You do not know how many tears he shed for you when you were not home. Next time, whatever you do, you need to think more about your husband!” I replied, “I did not do anything wrong. I just persist in what I think is right.” When he heard that, he lamented, “This is what people in China lack.”
My apartment is on the fifth floor. Our water is turned on by a specific provider at a designated time every day. If no one is home when the water is turned on, and we forgot to turn off the tap, the water will flood our apartment and then leak downstairs, causing losses to our neighbors.
We forgot to turn off the tap once and no one was home when the water was turned on. When I got back, the water was up to my ankles. I quickly went to find something to scoop up the water. Just as I was busy scooping it up, the downstairs neighbor brought their wet blankets to my door. The water had seeped through our floor into their cupboards, wetting their blankets. When I went to look, the leak was quite serious and some areas were already stained. I quickly apologized and said, “Our carelessness has done this. Don’t worry, I will help you wash them.” The neighbor said, “But these are all new blankets.” I said, “In that case, I will buy similar blankets for you.” The neighbor left her wet blankets and went home.
The next day, I went out to buy similar blankets. I also washed the wet ones, dried them, folded them, and brought all of them downstairs to the neighbor. The neighbor did not expect me to pay them back with new blankets and also wash and return the old ones, so they were very satisfied. They were a little embarrassed and said, “You can keep the old ones.” I said, “We are so very sorry, and we do not need them either, so it’d be best if you keep them for your own use.”
One morning the tub on the floor upstairs started leaking water into our tub. My husband said, “I will go upstairs and find out what has happened.” When he returned, he said, “I have asked them to see what the problem is. They can have it repaired.” Then he went to work.
My husband returned home at noon and saw that the tub upstairs was leaking faster and faster. He said, “The neighbor upstairs did not get it repaired! Let me go see. If they cannot get it repaired, I will not let them use their tub.” Because the water for our building is provided from a fixed location, we all use our tubs to store water to flush the toilet. I said to my husband, “Don’t go. They’ll have tear out their tub to find out where the problem is. If they do that, it will cost them several hundred yuan. Now you don’t want to let them use their tub. What if our neighbors downstairs had not let us use our tub when our water leaked into their apartment, how desperate would we have been? We can just catch the water in our tub.”
Heeding what I said, my husband did not go upstairs to find the neighbor. Miraculously, a while later the water leak slowed down, and a short while after that the leak stopped. It has never leaked again.
Our upstairs neighbor went out to run some errands and called an electric tricycle to take him. The driver of this tricycle happened to be a practitioner. When the neighbor got in the tricycle, the practitioner clarified the truth to him. Our neighbor said, “I do not know if Falun Dafa is good or bad. I only know that my neighbor (my name) is a good person. She cleans our staircases.”
This is how I have progressed little by little on my path of cultivation for so many years, starting from doing small things well, requiring myself to abide by Dafa’s standards in whatever I do, and using my actions to help people learn about Falun Dafa. This is how I validate the wonderfulness of Falun Dafa and use my kind acts to save the people around me.