(Clearwisdom.net) I was illegally detained for appealing at Tiananmen Square. A young man in his twenties by the name of Tang was locked in the same cell with me and several other Falun Dafa practitioners.
The first two days we met, Tang did not want to talk with us. He either slept or paced back and forth in the cell like a lion in a cage, often angrily kicking the wall and appearing very agitated. We showed him great kindness and were friendly to him. We explained that we wanted the best for him. We comforted him and suggested that his agitation and anger could only be harmful to his own body, yet could not solve any problem. We told him sincerely why one should be a good person.
Tang gradually changed his attitude toward us. He was willing to talk to us and listen to the truth of Falun Gong. Several days later, Tang woke up from his anger and talked to us from his heart.
Actually, he did not know anything about Falun Gong before the persecution had begun. Since July 20, 1999, when Jiang's regime started to slander and persecute Falun Gong, his brain had been filled with the evil propaganda every day and he had developed a hostile attitude toward Dafa and practitioners. Having observed our behavior and hearing us speak, he knew that he had been deceived by the government.
He said, "I observed you for two days and found that you are all very kind. Some of you are government officials, one of you is even a school principal. You lost everything and ended up in prison simply for speaking out about the truth. Yet you treat these matters lightly and are very optimistic. You even turned to comfort me and treated me so kindly. I admire you. You made me change my view about you. Upon hearing what you say about Falun Gong, I just know that Falun Gong is not like the propaganda on TV. People who practice Falun Gong are so good. I was totally deceived. Jiang's regime viciously persecutes you good people. It is indeed deceiving people. If the thieves in my gang had been wronged like this, we might have used dynamite to blow them all away!"
We are glad for his awakening. We also told him that Falun Gong practitioners cultivate "Truth, Compassion, Tolerance." We are good people at all times wherever we may be. We will not hit back when we are hit nor would we kill anyone.
We explained the truth about the persecution to him and introduced him to several of the principles of Falun Dafa. He came to understand that doing bad things generates karma and due retribution. He learned that losses must accompany all gains, etc. He said that although he could not practice Falun Gong, he would be a good person. He told us that he originally planned to take some of his gang members to the south to do a deal involving 400,000 Yuan of counterfeit money after his release. [Average monthly salary is about 500 Yuan for an urban worker in China] He understood that he should not commit such crimes, that he would lose virtue if he were to do the deal. He also told us that he had relationships with five girls at the same time and often showed them off as his possessions. Now he knew that this would harm them as well as himself. After his release, he said that he would confirm one of them as his girlfriend and break up with the other four. He also mentioned that his parents had scolded him for going astray and that he had not been back home for more than a year. Now he realized that he really hurt his parents' heart by doing this. After release, he would go back home as soon as possible to see his parents and apologize to them.
Before leaving the detention center, Tang said, "After I am out of here, I will tell all of my friends that everything on TV is fake and they should not believe it. People who practice Falun Gong are all good. I also want to appeal the injustice for you. I will go out into the street and yell 'Falun Dafa is good!' and 'Falun Dafa suffered injustice!' Even if they catch me, they can't really do anything to me, since I do not practice Falun Gong."
