(Clearwisdom.net)

The annual Lunen City Festival was held on September 9, 10 and 11, 2005, in the old industrial area of the Ruhr, Germany. Our participation in this year's festival was the first chance for people from many different ethnicities, including French and Bulgarian peoples, to see the Falun Gong booth and the practitioners' performances.

Practitioners doing exercise demo

Exercise demo beside booth

Crowds of people interested in Falun Gong

Our display boards showed magnificent scenes of Falun Gong's journey as it spread all over the world. There were pictures of Master Li Hongzhi demonstrating the exercises. The historical origins of the Srivatsa symbol were also annotated and on display. (Because of World War Two, it is very easy for many Germans to misunderstand the true meaning of the "Srivatsa" symbol that is included on Falun Gong's symbol of a Law Wheel, which is intrinsic to our practice). Furthermore, our handmade paper lotus flowers, our bookmarks, and practitioners' exercise demonstrations in traditional Chinese costume were all very eye-catching. There was a continuous stream of visitors stopping to watch and learn the truth from us.

Four Falun Gong practitioners performed a traditional lotus dance on the stage. Later, they also demonstrated the exercises while a German practitioner provided commentary to the people watching. The audience applauded warmly to this.

In front of the stage, there was an Asian couple with a young daughter watching the performance. They were from Vietnam. The interesting thing was that the little girl, who was about eight or nine years old, did not want to leave when her parents did. She followed the practitioners back to the booth and carefully read all the information boards and materials, and watched the exercise demonstration again. Some time after she left, she came back with some friends, who all wanted to learn the exercises. When they saw the practitioners folding the paper lotus flowers, they all came over and learned how to do it as well.

A little Vietnamese girl learns the exercises

She brings her friends over to learn too

There were so many people who came to our stall to find out more about Falun Gong. Our practitioners were extremely busy; they hardly had any time to have a break! Many people expressed their willingness to learn the exercises. Some of them had never ever encountered qigong; however, they were deeply attracted to the words "Truthfulness, Compassion, Tolerance." On the other hand, some people had learned some other kinds of qigong, yoga or martial arts before, but they still took great interest in Falun Gong.

The sky got progressively darker throughout the day, but it did not stop people coming around to see our information boards and watch the exercise demonstrations. The peaceful music reverberated in the pleasant twilight of the evening filled with infinite compassion.

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