(Minghui.org) Ms. Wu Yanxia used to be a senior lecturer at Tianjin City Landscape School in Tianjin City, China. She suffered from severe neurosis, but recovered completely without medical treatment after she started practicing Falun Gong. When the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) decided to ban Falun Gong in July 1999, Ms. Wu was devastated as a member of the CCP of 28 years who had always kept up with the party's political policies. She had insisted on becoming the person the CCP expected her to be, but realized that she could no longer be the type of person the CCP ordered her to be if it meant forsaking her humanity.

 
Ms. Wu Yanxia (right) participates in a parade in Chinatown in Toronto in celebration of World Falun Dafa Day in May 2012

Ms. Wu, despite repeatedly being arrested in China because she refused to renounce Falun Gong, persevered in sharing important facts about the practice. She eventually chose to immigrate to Toronto with her family in September 2001. Ms. Wu has been going to the Chinese Consulate in Toronto every week for 11 years to protest the communist regime's persecution of Falun Gong. She has been distributing materials containing important information about the practice in Toronto's Chinatown. She has tried hard to approach overseas Chinese people with sincerity in the hope of saving them from falling prey to the CCP's false propaganda about Falun Gong, and helping them understand how wonderful Falun Gong is.

Falun Gong Cured Her Neurosis

Ms. Wu Yanxia first learned about Falun Gong at the end of 1996. She was a senior lecturer at Tianjin City Landscape School and had been awarded as an excellent teacher by the city. She taught there for 18 years. She taught chemistry and worked as a supervisor of four classes. The school accepts applications from all over China, so she has taught students from all over the country.

Ms. Wu recalled, "My health took a toll because I was too devoted to work and did not have a regular schedule. I had severe stomach ulcers, neurasthenia, and neurosis, which made it difficult for me to work."

The neurosis was the worst of all. When she worked too hard for a few days in a row, she would scream at night. She lived in a three-household townhouse at the time. Every time the neurosis surfaced, she would scream at night and wake up her neighbors. Her neighbors thought she had gone insane. But Ms. Wu did not even realize it when she was overcome with neurosis. She only felt terribly tired the next morning. She would feel as if her bones had weakened, and did not have the energy to go to work. She sought help from both Chinese and western medicine, but they did very little for her.

After her husband started practicing Falun Gong, he heard from fellow practitioners that people had been cured of many different illnesses when they practiced Falun Gong. He suggested that she start practicing Falun Gong as well, but she refused to believe the stories. It was not until a fellow practitioner going to the same Falun Gong exercise group practice site as her husband made the same suggestion that she began practicing Falun Gong. She said, "Even if it does not cure your illness, it will not do you harm." Ms. Wu started practicing Falun Gong reluctantly. Yet she felt much better after two months.

One day a neighbor asked her husband, "Your wife has been quiet at night lately. How was she cured?" Her husband said, "She now practices Falun Gong." That night she asked her husband, "How did our neighbors know I used to scream at night? Did you tell anyone about my neurosis?" That was when her husband finally told her how ill she had been and how much noise she used to make. He did not have the heart to tell her previously because he did not want to hurt her pride.

She decided to keep practicing Falun Gong since it was mitigating her neurosis. She became completely healthy six months later.

Love and Devotion for Her Students

Falun Gong's miraculous healing power has altered her notions instilled by the CCP. She felt Falun Gong provides a pure land after she attended several Falun Gong practitioners' cultivation experience sharing conferences.

She said, "In this pure land, I have witnessed people becoming healthy and improving their morality. Their minds are being cleansed and purified. The Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance they manifest has touched me deeply. I feel humbled before them. I used to think of myself as a great person because I have repeatedly been awarded as an excellent teacher by the city. I used to be proud and look down on others. Now I think everyone else in this cultivation group is a better person than I am because they do not seek fame or wealth. They think of others first."

Ms. Wu has since tried to be thoughtful of others. She tries to apply a stricter standard to herself than others. It has become her creed to harbor great ambitions while being mindful of small details. She was the first to arrive at school and last to leave.

When it was time for summer and winter vacations, she would insist on seeing her students off at the train station before she returned home. She recalled, "I always went to school on the first day of each semester to check if all the students had arrived and if they had food. If they did not have food, I would take them home and cook for them. I treated my students like my own children. My students liked me very much. We got along very well and we were very close."

Those students who came from farming villages had a lot of financial difficulties. Ms. Wu took money out of her own pocket to help them out. She would even pay for those students who did not have enough money for practicing training after graduation. She did not want them to feel beholden, so she told them she found financial assistance from the school. When they found out the truth afterward, they often took the train and came visiting with presents.

Ms. Wu was awarded as model teacher in 1997 and given $1,000 USD. She donated the money to Hope Engineering. The faculty, students, and parents had a lot of respect for her because she was a devoted teacher and truly cared for the students. Some parents even tried to find connections to send their children to her class.

A Bribe of 2,000 Yuan from Parents

Ms. Wu's affection for her students touched their parents, many of whom drove to town with gifts of rice, oil, and meat at the end of each year, but she always politely declined the presents.

Ms. Wu took over a different class in the second half of 1997. Two parents from Jilin said little when they met her on the day of registration, but they returned at the end of the day.

They told her, "We felt you are a very nice and kindhearted teacher when we met you earlier today. Today is Teacher's Day. We would like to buy you a present, but we didn't find anything suitable after a day of shopping. Why don't we give you cash so that you can buy anything you like. It will be a present for you."

They each stuffed a paper packet into her pocket. She took the packets out and tried to return them, but they stuffed the packets into her pocket again. Another new student had arrived, so she had no choice but to temporarily part with them and accept the new student first.

She recalled, "By the time I finished and went back to the student dormitory, they had already left. I opened the packets to find 1,000 yuan in each packet. I was alerted instantly. I am a Falun Gong practitioner. I must not accept the money. But what would I do with the money? I thought all night long."

The next day Ms. Wu created two bank certificates and invited the two students from Jilin to her home. She put the bank certificates in their hands and explained to them, "Your parents have given me so much money out of their love for you. You must remember how much your parents love you and study hard so that you can repay them with excellent academic performances. Follow the school rules and do not create any trouble. Do not let your parents worry for you from far away."

She added, "I don't know your parents well, so do not tell them I have given the money back to you yet." Their parents learned about it a year later and were very touched. They made a trip from Jilin to Tianjin to call on her. They exclaimed, "You are such a wonderful person. The level of devotion you have shown to our children is far beyond what money can buy. You have touched our children with your integrity and kindness. They have matured a lot. They are no longer as selfish, and know to be thoughtful of others. It is all because of your education. As parents, we do not know how to thank you."

Ms. Wu responded, "It is my responsibility as a teacher to impart knowledge and care for the health and development of my students. Moreover, I practice Falun Gong. My teacher has taught us to be thoughtful of others at all times to eventually become a selfless and altruistic enlightened being."

The two parents were both businessmen. They kept shaking their hands in dismay, "I don't understand you! We would never have imagined there are still people like you left in today's society. We are both businessmen. We do not have time to educate our children, so we have been giving presents to their schoolteachers since they started elementary school. We have never thought there is anything wrong with it. No teacher has refused our presents. You are the very first one! It is really a first!"

Facing the Persecution

Ms. Wu found it incredible that such a wonderful cultivation practice which emphasizes morality would be banned by the Chinese communist regime. Ms. Wu had been a member of the CCP for 28 years and had always kept up with the CCP's political policies, but now she wondered whether she had been right to believe in the CCP at all.

She said, "When the school first asked me for a meeting, and at the meeting asked me to assure that I would stop practicing Falun Gong, I signed an agreement to stop practicing Falun Gong with tears and with trembling hands. I thought I must always support the CCP's decision. But when I thought of how the CCP was using my influence to deceive the Chinese people and to tell the media that I had been fooled by Falun Gong and that Falun Gong had caused me a lot of physical and mental damages, I found myself unable to acquiesce. It would have exceeded my bottom line as a human being. I might not have doubted the CCP or any of its policies in the first half of my life, but this time I was convinced the CCP is wrong!"

She chose to remain silent. This was the very first time she failed to follow the orders of the CCP. She told the truth, "Falun Gong has benefited me physically and spiritually."

She said, "The CCP that I had always trusted and protected abandoned me overnight."

She found police officers monitoring her at work and near her home. Her phone was tapped. She was followed when she went out. She was even sent to a forced brainwashing center.

She recalled, "I was unable to work. I was unable to live my life after work. Even when I went back to my parents' home or the home of my parents-in-law during the holidays, I would find a police car following me. My younger brother and sister had been arrested and sent to forced labor camps. I did not want my parents, my relatives, or my friends to worry for me any longer. I finally left China in September 2001 for Canada. I left the land I love, my elderly mother and parents-in-law, my siblings, and my friends. I left all my students that had been keeping in touch many years after graduation. My family and I immigrated to Canada."

Ms. Wu said, "I often think of my motherland and my countrymen, even in my dreams!"

Spreading the Truth about Falun Gong in a Foreign Land

Ms. Wu maintained a busy life after she arrived in Toronto. She insists on going to the Chinese Consulate every weekend to protest the persecution of Falun Gong and to Chinatown to distribute materials containing important facts about Falun Gong.

She said, "Most of the Chinese people here did not understand what really happened for the first few years. They looked at me with hatred, indifference, and confusion. I felt frustrated and defeated once, but I bounded back after I realized the responsibility and significance of being in Chinatown. Even if people refuse to take any materials or listen to what I have to say, they will get to see what Falun Gong practitioners are really like. I decided to melt their hearts of ice with kindness and compassion."

Ms. Wu and other local Falun Gong practitioners have not wasted their time. More and more people now know the truth about Falun Gong and have even developed respect for Falun Gong practitioners.

One day she saw a man in his 40s who lives with his mother standing before the posters pertaining to Falun Gong. She offered him a flyer, but he said he already had one from an old lady near 80 years old. The man asked, "Is this all true?"

Ms. Wu told him that she came from China and saw many fellow Falun Gong practitioners arrested. Her own younger brother and sister were arrested and sentenced to two years in prison. She, too, had been arrested twice. The man quietly listened to her for over an hour until he was tired from standing and had to leave.

He told Ms. Wu that he lives nearby and comes to Chinatown every week for grocery shopping. Ms. Wu said, "I've seen him in Chinatown very often since then. He said that people typically give him a wide berth when they hear he had liver disease for fear of possible infection. Only Falun Gong practitioners do not shy away from him and never look down on him. He feels Falun Gong practitioners carry a very positive energy. He feels very comfortable standing near Falun Gong practitioners every time."

One day he told Ms. Wu, "I have talked to many Falun Gong practitioners. I feel everyone here is so peaceful and kind. The Chinese government must be crazy to be afraid of Falun Gong practitioners! Some say you are paid to be here. I'd sooner be dead than believe that."

When asked why he does not think Falun Gong practitioners are paid to be there, he said, "Think about it. I may be ill. I may be unemployed. I may live on social welfare, but I will never allow my mother to stand here in the cold just to make money. You must have a cause or a spiritual belief to do this."

When the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party was published, Ms. Wu asked him if he had read it. He said he was reading it. He was never a member of the CCP, but he was once a member of the Party's Youth League. He agreed to quit the league. He said, "Falun Gong would never steer me wrong." He showed his name on a credit card and said, "I will use my real name, not a pseudonym, to declare that I quit the Youth League."

When Shen Yun Performing Arts came to Toronto, Ms. Wu wanted to buy him a ticket since he lives on social welfare. He declined right away, "You must not pay for my ticket! You have given so much! I will get a ticket myself!"

Ms. Wu said, "We became good friends after many years. Every time I ask him how he is doing, he says, 'Thanks to Falun Gong, I have been well.'"