Spreading Falun Dafa in India in Summer 2000
Preparation
A man from India living in Sweden, Mr R, had been searching for a method thatcould help the Indian people. One day he met a Falun Dafa practitioner whointroduced Dafa to him. Then he read the book Zhuan Falun and liked it very much. He was inspired to spread Dafa in India. So he called some practitioners in Sweden and USA and we started to plan the spreading of Fa in India. Would we really leave the beautiful Swedish summer for hot India? We received some warnings from India: "It will be the hottest summer in 50 years! Will you really be able to hold workshops?" We knew that this was only testing us. We were very determined and thought that this opportunity couldn't be missed. We didn't want to lose one day. We knew Fashen had arranged all this and would take care of us.
Finally there were three practitioners from Sweden, plus one Swedish practitioner living in Bangkok and two from US. Mr R would also be there to help us with practical arrangements. He has a lot of contacts with spiritual people, media, etc. A very extensive and positive article was published in the June issue of Life Positive (a new age magazine) and we put an ad in it informing about our coming workshops.
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The workshops
The first workshop was held on Sunday the 25th of June. About 35 people attended. We introduced ourselves and shortly introduced Falun Dafa. Then westarted to teach the exercises, we had a break after 2 hours and answeredquestions, then we continued for about another 2 hours. We also showed the exercise video.
We found that the Indians were very interested, teachable and open-minded. They were also very warm-hearted and kind. Many of them had tried different methods before and there were a lot of Reiki-healers present at the workshop. One lady, Dr K, had fallen and injured her knee four months earlier. She had tried several types of therapies without success. But after attending the first Falun Gong workshop, 95 per cent of the pain was gone, she told us.
June 26-27 and 29-30, we held workshops for newcomers in the hall that we had rented and there were about 10 to 20 participants. Two practitioners from France joined the team and helped us during a couple of days. Then they traveled to Nepal and other parts of India.
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The 9-day video lectures
The 9-day video lectures started on Saturday the 1th of July. The first day about30 people attended. Later people dropped off and about 4-5 people ended upnot missing one single day of the video seminar. 5 others had missed a couple of days. Some people had difficulties with hearing the translation and some people went home early. Some experienced body cleansings and some of them perhaps didn't really understand what it was. We had explained these things before the first video-lecture but maybe we should have been even clearer. We decided to read from the book before each lecture and it helped the participants a lot. They really liked reading.
One man told us that his brother had urged him to attend the workshops, because he himself could not. This man did not know if he would participate in the video lectures, but when the first one started he said: "Something made me come, even though I have to travel by motorbike for 1 hour back home at night." He said also at the end of the video sessions, that he knew that if rain would have come he would not have been able to attend. It was monsoon season, but no rain came during these 9 days. He said: "Everybody is complaining about the heat, but I am happy, I could attend every evening!" One evening he drove the bike home. It was dark. He suddenly saw across the road a pile of stones that he could not possibly pass. He tried to stop the vehicle, but it was too late, so he closed his eyes. When he looked up again, he was safely on the other side! Nothing had happened to him! He said: "I feel I am protected by the Master" It was a miracle of Falun Dafa.
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Morning practice
Every morning at 6 to 8.30 we practised in a park. Sometimes about 20-30 people attended. Some of them were new and they had heard about us by word of mouth or were just passing by. Indian people are used to doing morning exercises, like people in China.
One morning a young girl came to our practise site. She is 9 years old and lives close to the park. Her father had also been practising with us some mornings. She learned the movements very fast and was also very curious about Falun Gong. Some times she read Lunyu in English with us. She said: "Oh, Buddha Fa is a China God, isn't it?" We explained to her the meaning of Buddha Fa. She liked to read with us. She brought her friends and soon she was also teaching them.
Another morning 5 or 6 small children were curiously watching us. They were very dirty and poor. When one of us approached them and asked if they wanted to join us, they were afraid and run away. Some of the new Indian practitioners explained in Hindi that they were welcome and soon they were practising all the 4 standing exercises together with us. Some of them came every morning to practice. We asked one of those girls, 10-11 years old, how she felt when practising. She said it made her feel calm and peaceful.
After our first week in Delhi, we found a new park that was more suitable for spreading Dafa; Nehru Park. It was a large beautiful park where many people used to walk and do their exercises early in the morning. A lot of people came to learn the exercises there. Here, they had never heard of qigong (not even Taichi). They always began by associating us with Yoga.
We met a man working at an Embassy while we were practising in the park. He started to converse with one of us and came to join our practise every morning. He told us that he had never practised any exercise before, only one month ago did he start to take walks around this park. At the beginning, he told us that he had a pain in his shoulder and that he was only interested in learning the exercise to help in taking away the pain ....he was NOT interested in the teachings at all. He also said he could not possibly sit on the ground to do the meditation exercise, because his body was stiff. Then one day he was involved in a deep conversation with one practitioner from Sweden and he sat down with her, without thinking about it, and suddenly he was just sitting in a single lotus. He was very surprised and happy! One day, after practice he told us that he had an experience during the sitting meditation. At one moment, he heard a big crack in his shoulder ... he thought ... this is it ... it is going to be soooo painful!!! But to his surprise, the pain was almost all gone. He was so excited that he asked one of us to shake his hand and to test the strength he had regained in his arm. Then he even went to the bookstore to buy "China Falun Gong" and "Zhuan Falun".
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Mass media
One man who joined our activities had heard about Falun Gong when the Chinesegovernment banned it. When he read the article in "Life Positive" magazine, hedecided to join this workshop and the 9-day lectures. Many people gave thanks to this article and one evening we met the editor and the journalist who wrote it.
We thanked them by giving them the most precious gifts: China Falun Gong and Zhuan Falun. We met quite a few journalists. A journalist from"The Times of India" (a big newspaper) interviewed us. When one of us was telling him some stories from Chinese practitioners he was deeply moved to tears. Later he called and said "I want to interview you again!" After the article he received many positive phone calls and he also wanted to learn more about Falun Gong. "Life Positive" interviewed us and took photos for another article that will be published in August.
Business Standard wrote an article and took pictures when we practised on a roof, and "India Today" (a political magazine) wrote an article about Chinese culture where Falun Gong was included. "India Today" didn't contact us (they photographed us though). A young lady passed by one day and wanted to learn our practice. She was a journalist at "Hindustan Times" (another big newspaper) and decided later to write about us. After meeting us she started to come to our indoor practice that we had every day before the video lectures. She felt the movements were very powerful and she learned all the 5 sets of exercises.
"India.com", a web site, also interviewed us, they wanted to put information about Falun Gong on their website. It seems like as if this trip was very well planned!
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Other happenings
During the daytime we usually stayed at our hotel and studied Fa for a few hours in our rooms. It was too hot to be outdoors, sometimes more than 40 C. Sometimes we split into two groups and did different things, for instance some of us went to visit some Embassies.
One day we met a man in the Nehru Park, who invited us to attend the inauguration ceremony for a new Health Product Company. There happened to be people invited from some embassies, some politicians as well, and a famous film producer. Also some participants from our workshops were there to our glad surprise. At the end of the ceremony, which was very spiritual, it was also funny because the speech held by the film producer, made us think of Spreading Fa in India. He was for instance talking about something like starting by a small stream and then flowing into a powerful current At the end of the ceremony, the person who had invited us, pointed at us and urged the listeners to try the new Chinese Yoga called Falun Gong that had arrived to India and Nehru Park every morning. After the ceremony some people came over to us curious about Falun Gong. One of our Indian friends said, now after this ceremony you belong to the family. Wherever Fa takes us, it is important, nothing is a coincidence.
Two days after the video lectures were completed it started to rain early in the morning, we were pondering whether or not to go for our usual practice at the Nehru Park. We went outdoors to check, well, it was not too bad, so we called for a taxi. Then it started to rain a lot more, should we still go? Would anyone turn up? We decided to drive over there and have a look. When we arrived, it stopped raining and the air was fresh and cool. We ended up having a very nice morning practice with some newcomers as well as some of our new friends from the workshops.
Mr R's mother said that after the nine day video lectures, everyone had been calling her to thank her for helping organising Falun Gong in India and to say how wonderful Falun Gong is. She had sent out many letters to people she knew about our activities. The Swedish practitioners left India at different dates (9-14 July). The two practitioners from USA are still in India and will do more spreading of Fa there. Something we found out about Indian People: they were always very helpful towards each other, for instance as soon as some people knew the movements fairly well, they started helping to correct movements for others, and also very eagerly told more people about Falun Gong. We were also surprised by their spirituality and deep understanding of life. Even after spending such a short time we got really in deep contact with the Indian practitioners and we have learned a lot during these weeks. Many people have the predestined relationship with Fa in India and many, many are still waiting to obtain the Fa! Fa is beyond limitations as language, race and religion. Fa is boundless.
India Hongfa Group, 30 July 2000
[Translated from http://www.minghui.ca/gb/0001/Aug/16/summer_vocation.html ]
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Morning practice and instructions in Municipal Park, Dehli
Morning practice and instructions in Nehru Park, Dehli
