Bay Area pair tell of China ordeal ordeal
Falun Gong followers
get hard labor, cold cell
BY ANNE MARTINEZ
Mercury News Staff Writer
Tired and sore from sleeping on cold floors in a detention center in south
China, Alan Huang and Alicia Zhao returned to their Bay Area homes
Wednesday after their trip to Hong Kong to meet with fellow members of the
Falun Gong spiritual movement turned into a two-week nightmare.
Their stories of 13-hour work days -- cleaning pig pens and piecing
together hair brushes -- and cramped, cold cells shared by dozens of
prisoners offer the first close-up glimpse into the Chinese government's
aggressive campaign to prosecute members of the controversial sect.
Described by followers as a combination of yoga, meditation and
traditional breathing exercises, Falun Gong has rattled Chinese officials
with its ability to swiftly mobilize thousands of members. The government
has called the movement the most significant political threat to national
security since the 1989 student uprising at Tiananmen Square, and banned
the practice of Falun Gong in China.
Since July, Chinese authorities have rounded up thousands of Falun Gong
members, ransacking homes and confiscating promotional materials. Four
leading members of the sect, also known as Falun Dafa, were sentenced this
week to seven to 18 years in prison for their involvement.
Officials at the Chinese consulate in San Francisco did not return calls
for comment Wednesday.
Huang and Zhao said they knew the risks they faced when they traveled to
their homeland.
We knew there might be a chance something would happen, but we felt it was
our right to go, a weary Huang said from his Sunnyvale home, just one hour
after he arrived at San Francisco International Airport from Hong Kong.
Compared to the experience we had, there's others who have been treated
much worse. Huang and Zhao, both Chinese citizens with U.S. residency, set
out Dec. 11 to Hong Kong for a one-day experience sharing conference.
There they met with 1,000 other Falun Gong members who exchanged stories
of spiritual healing and daily miracles.
The pair then traveled by train to Shen-zhen, a small town on the border
of Hong Kong, where they gathered for an evening of exercises with other
Falun Gong followers at an apartment. Tired, they returned to their hotel
rooms only to be rousted out of bed at 5 a.m. the following morning by
Chinese authorities who demanded their identification papers.
They took our passports and green cards, and told us to go to their police
station that afternoon to pick them up, said Huang, a software engineer
and father of a 4-year-old daughter. When we got there, they asked us a
lot of questions, and we weren't allowed to leave. Huang, 37, and Zhao,
29, were charged with disturbing social order and immediately sent to a
detention center, where they were told they would spend the following 15
days before being allowed to return to the United States.
In near-freezing temperatures, the two slept in separate cells with dozens
of prisoners. Huang shared one bed and a blanket with 12 other men. Zhao
slept on the floor with 37 other women in a cell with one toilet that
didn't flush. Some cellmates were fellow Falun Gong followers, including
Lili Feng, a scientist at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego.
They ate rice and tofu in the morning and cabbage in the afternoon. While
Huang cleaned pig pens and putrid-smelling facilities, Zhao and Feng made
hair brushes.
They forced us to make 70 hair brushes a day. . . . if you didn't finish,
they wouldn't let you sleep, said Zhao, a Foster City resident who works
as a marketing manager for Intershop, an e-commerce Web site. It was very
cold, and we were forced to take off our shoes. The trio, including Feng,
were released Monday, two days earlier than expected. Their experiences
reveal the danger facing U.S. Falun Gong members who travel to China, said
Gail Rachlin, a spokeswoman for the group in New York.
Despite facing arrest and being stripped of their possessions, Chinese
Falun Gong followers hold daily silent protests in Beijing to appeal to
authorities to lift the ban that has been in effect since July. The group
claims to have 10 million members worldwide.
They have such strong, ingrained beliefs, they just keep going out there,
she said. We're trying to resolve this peacefully by starting a dialogue.
Falun Gong has divided U.S. lawmakers, some of whom have distanced
themselves from the movement. And some human rights advocates question the
group's insistence that Falun Gong is not a formal organization, with no
formal leader.
The movement has amassed so many followers it has posed a threat to the
Communist Party, who fear any organized group they cannot control, said
Frank Lu, founder of the Hong Kong-based Information Center of Human
Rights and Democratic Movement in China.
It's a very big problem for the Communist Party, Lu said. I think there's
a bigger crackdown now because there's so many members. Falun Gong was
founded in 1992 by Li Hongzhi, who lives in New York. In addition to
promoting spiritual healing through daily exercises, the sect teaches
frugality and abstinence from liquor and tobacco. Many followers shun
modern medicine as a means to cure illness.
Huang said he began practicing Falun Gong three years ago as an escape
from his hectic life as a software engineer for San Jose-based Xilinx.
It has really brought me a lot of health benefits and helped me gain a
peaceful mind, he said.
Zhao said she also feels physically stronger and more relaxed since she
started practicing Falun Gong. The exercises, she said, helped her get
through the past two weeks.
Contact Anne Martinez at amartinez@sjmercury.com
or (408) 920-5445.
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