(Clearwisdom.net) Encouraged by an article titled "Call For Articles Themed, 'Bearing Witness To History'" at Clearwisdom.net (http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2003/10/23/41546.html), I decided to share my personal experience of appealing for Falun Dafa on July 20, 1999.
Early in the morning of July 20, 1999, I heard that the police had arrested some practitioners and ransacked practitioners' homes. Those who had heard the news hurried to the Hebei provincial government to appeal for Falun Dafa. Because the provincial government refused to intervene, many practitioners left for Beijing that very day, hoping to appeal to the State Council's Appeal Office. Several fellow practitioners and I bought train tickets to Beijing that would leave at noon, but the police officers stopped us when we tried to check in. Then they stopped selling train tickets to Beijing, so we decided to buy train tickets to a destination further away from Shijiazhuang than Beijing, and get off in Beijing instead. Thus we finally arrived in Beijing at midnight of July 21.
Never had we expected that as soon as we exited the train station, the Beijing police would lure us to an area where they already had many Dafa practitioners in custody. When we realized what had happened, we stayed up all night clarifying the truth to the police officers about Falun Dafa and telling them that we would like an opportunity to appeal to the State Council's Appeal Office. The police officers promised us, "We will take you there at dawn." We patiently waited over the course of the night, and witnessed the police bringing in many more Dafa practitioners. On 8:30 AM of July 21, when we saw several trucks filled with Dafa practitioners passing through downtown and heading towards the rural areas of Beijing, we realized that the police officers had been lying. They had never planned to take us to the State Council's Appeal Office; instead, they were sending us back to our hometowns. The Beijing police took us to a stadium in Beijing where they videotaped us, and recorded our names and addresses. Next, they took us to a giant field, where the police arranged rides to take us home. There I ran into a practitioner I knew. The police had grabbed her hair, punched her brutally, and then handcuffed her, all in the courtyard of the State Council's Appeal Office. When I met her in the giant exercise yard, I could still see the distinct marks of handcuffs on her wrists.
After briefly sharing our understandings, we decided that we shouldn't go home until we had achieved our goal of appealing to the State Council's Appeal Office. We formed square formations and sat on the floor. Some of us were doing the sitting meditation, while some of us recited Teacher's articles softly. It was noon at the end of July, the scorching sun positioned right above our heads. There was not a single tree in the field to provide shade. With the blazing sun baking our skin and the heat from the ground, it was as if we were being boiled in a steamer pot. The heat, however, could not change our mind to appeal for Dafa. Seeing that no one would get in the cars, the police officers brought several German shepherds into the field. The dogs barked at us loudly. Some babies in the arms of female Dafa practitioners were scared by the dogs' barking and started crying. The field was filled with sounds of the dogs' barking and babies' crying. At this moment, a female practitioner stood up from the square formations and led everyone to recite Teacher's Hong Yin with her loud, clear voice. As we recited Teacher's magnificent, powerful poems in Hong Yin in unison, our voice rose up to the sky above the giant exercise yard. When remembering this moving scene, I felt that it had been a battle between the righteous and the evil.
Our action to protect Dafa shocked the evil and enraged the police officers. To stop us from reciting the Fa, the police cut off the only water supply in the exercise yard. Among the Dafa practitioners in the yard, there were babies aged no more than 2-3 months, and some very elderly folks. Each Dafa practitioner endured the blazing sun under the intense pressure from the police around us. Even though everyone was soaked with sweat, no one, including the elderly and the small children, left the square formations. The Dafa practitioners recited Teacher's articles in unison without break.
Time seemed to crawl here. Approximately around 4-5 PM, a full armored riot team carrying machine guns, as well as several men resembling government officials, came into the field. The riot team "secured" the entire area and watched us intently. It was only after several Dafa practitioners, who came forward and represented us, had negotiated with the government officials, that we got in the cars and went home. Afterwards, I heard some fellow practitioners pretended to leave but returned to Beijing the same night.
On the following day, July 22, I went to the group exercise site on 3:30 AM as usual, and started to practice the sitting meditation. After finishing practicing the sitting meditation, we found there were a few practitioners at our group practice site. So Dafa practitioners from the two neighboring group practice sites did the standing exercises together as one group. During the exercises, I felt a strong energy flowing in my body, and I could almost feel Teacher standing right next to us. Remembering Teacher's benevolence, I burst into tears and could not stop. Nevertheless, I finished the standing exercises in tears. Teacher said, "By July 20th of 1999 I had already pushed all of the pre-July 20 students to their positions--I pushed you to your highest positions." ("Touring North America to Teach the Fa") Many of my personal cultivation experiences have confirmed these words to be most true.
That day (July 22) I got on the train to Beijing again. The only thought on my mind was: "No one will stop me from appealing for Dafa." I passed the police's interrogation on the train, arrived in Beijing successfully without any trouble, and ran into many fellow practitioners there. We then embarked on a new journey of helping Teacher rectify the Fa and cultivating ourselves in Fa-rectification work.
