In New York City's Chinatown, there are many precious Chinese people who have been poisoned by the Chinese dictator's vicious slander against Dafa. For the past four months, we have been holding photo exhibits and exercise demonstrations in Chinatown to help clarify the truth. The following are a few understandings and cultivation experiences reported by New York and New Jersey practitioners.
I. Avoiding the Group Mentality
Although large group activities were effective in drawing the public's attention, we often ran into problems when groups of undocumented workers, instigated by thugs who are paid by the Chinese Consulate, would disrupt our events. They would try to start an argument with one or two practitioners who were handing out flyers, and eventually they would surround those practitioners and start to yell at them. This was a large xinxing test for several practitioners because often they would get pulled into the mentality of the group and start to argue with the group, which just made the group get louder and louder. In several cases, it amounted to the police having to come and break-up the crowd.
We eventually came to the understanding that it's much more effective for practitioners not to approach large groups of people since it didn't serve the purpose of clarifying the truth at all. Instead many practitioners found that if they quietly approached a person who was sitting by himself behind the crowd, they could engage in a meaningful and "heart to heart" conversation.
After two months of organizing group events in the park, we started to realize that is very important foráthe participants of these type of activities to have a very good understanding of the purpose of our duties and the importance that relates to this activity. And it's important to get together afterwards to share what we learn and what we can do better for next time.
II. Using Different Approaches to Clarify the Truth
One weekend in November, while the Canadian SOS Walkers were in town, a group of about 50 practitioners decided to form groups of 2 or 3 practitioners and distribute materials and speak to the storeowners in every street of Chinatown. Each group had a Mandarin speaker, a Cantonese speaker and a Western practitioner. We started out by studying the Fa and then sharing experiences about previous efforts in Chinatown. Each group was then assigned a specific route and brought along as many truth clarifying materials as possible.
A) Westerners Speaking Chinese
Many of the westerners learned a few words in Chinese, such as "Falun Dafa Hao" ("Falun Dafa is good.") and "Falun Gong Zhen Xiang" ("Falun Gong Truth Clarifying"). I found that if I said "Ni Hao" (a greeting) and then "Falun Gong Zhen Xiang", it would quickly grab the attention of passersby's who were intrigued by a tall, westerner speaking Chinese in the heart of Chinatown.
I tried to emanate the brilliance of a Dafa particle the best way that I could, which usually manifested in the form of a very large smile. Even though some of the people chose to not take a flyer, most walked away with a smile and a positive image of Dafa. I always replied with "Xie-Xie" ("Thanks") as they walked away.
B) Being Selfless while clarify the truth
One male Chinese practitioner and one female westerner practitioner decided to go to the park where we had been holding our group events---this is where large groups of undocumented Chinese workers hang out all day and play mahjong. The majority of these people are illegally brought into the US from Fujian province. They don't have enough money to rent their own room at the outrageously high prices the Smugglers charge, so they share a single bed with another person in shifts and have to stay outside while the other person sleeps. [Note: Because they are so poor they become easily bought by the Chinese consulate, looking for ways to persecute Falun Gong overseas by hiding behind others.]
The two practitioners decided to hand flyers out to some of these illegal workers who were talking in small group. Right away, the men started to yell and swear at the practitioners. The Chinese practitioner tried to explain to them that Falun Gong is good and that the persecution of Dafa is wrong.
One of the men was drunk and not very coherent. The others started to push him into the female practitioner. The practitioner remained calm and didn't let this distract her from her goal of clarifying the truth. She calmly said to the men, "What is it that you want from us?" One of the men exclaimed, "We want money!" She then said, "if I had money right now, I would give it to you." The men were surprised and began to calm down. She then asked the man who responded why it was that he could not make money on his own. He then began to explain about how Fujians are discriminated against in Chinatown and it's very difficult for them to get jobs. He said that he was very unhappy and would like to know of a way out of his suffering. The female practitioner calmly said that Falun Dafa could end his suffering and eventually told him that he should read Zhuan Falun. The Chinese practitioner had a copy of Zhuan Falun that he had owned for 5 years---he immediately offered it to the man. The man gladly accepted it and said that he would read it.
After the event the western practitioner shared her experience and understanding with us. She said that she had learned the importance of using compassion and selflessness while clarify the truth the Chinese people. Instead of using the mentality of "I need to clarify the truth to this person ...and I need to use my wit to convince this person that Dafa is good", she was genuinely concerned about the well being of this person. The man was so moved by the fact that a westerner was truly concerned about him that the evil forces must have fled and thus the man was able to change his views about Dafa.
"If we determine that it is interference or [an attempt to do] damage, when we deal with the specific problem we should try our best to be calm and kind to these people who are at the surface, because when the evil uses people, these people themselves usually aren't aware of it (although those people who are used are usually either people whose thoughts are just bad or people who have bad thoughts arising)." (Fa-Rectification and Cultivation)
In light of Master's latest lecture at Florida, I can now see how truly magnificent this event was! "It doesn't matter if what you do is expose the evil, or if you use all sorts of approaches, be they direct, indirect or from different angles--as long as you can have people recognize this persecution, you are saving them, and you are extraordinary."
á III. Evil always dissolves in front of the righteous
The following is from a Chinese practitioner who participated in the walk through Chinatown: "At one point, I walked into a Chinese restaurant and handed over a flyer to a waitress.á As I continued to walk towards a table of 5-6 people, a man angrily got up and shouted that the flyer was "garbage."á I didn't move but looked straight in his eyes.á About 5 seconds passed, someone called out and said that one flyer was good for everyone.á At the same time, that man quickly replied and said that one flyer was good enough. Look who's truly afraid now?á The truth is, "evil always dissolves in front of the righteous!"
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Category: Journeys of Cultivation
