(Clearwisdom.net) Eleven years ago, about ten thousand Falun Gong practitioners went to appeal along Fuyou Street, near Zhongnanhai on April 25, 1999. They were calling for the release of 45 Falun Gong practitioners who had been unlawfully arrested by the police in Tianjin. Within three months after the peaceful appeal, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regime, using the incident as an excuse, started a brutal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. This shocked people both inside and outside of China, and the international community was eager to know what was happening.

Since then, many people have learned more about Falun Gong and have become practitioners. Mr. Zhang Yongxiang from Taiwan is one of them.

Zhang Yongxiang after work near Taipei 101 Tower

Becoming a Falun Gong practitioner after being ordered to investigate the practice

Mr. Zhang graduated from the Taiwan Police Academy and joined the police force. When the CCP started to persecute Falun Gong, Mr. Zhang was serving at the local police station in Neihu District at the time, and he received orders from the Police Bureau of Taipei Municipality to investigate Falun Gong activities in Taiwan. At that time, there were only several tens of thousands of Falun Gong practitioners in Taiwan. It just so happened that a neighbourhood leader in his jurisdiction was a Falun Gong practitioner, so he went to talk to him to learn more about it. He learned that Falun Gong was completely open and aboveboard. The neighbourhood leader told him about the practice in detail and gave him quite a few pieces of informational materials.

Mr. Zhang said, "After I took the materials home and read them, I felt that Falun Gong was very good, and it was totally different from what was said in the CCP propaganda. I found the conduct of the neighbourhood leader very good, so I wrote in the investigation report that Falun Gong did not have any unlawful gathering in Taiwan and it is a very good cultivation group. Everything about them is very good."

Mr. Zhang wanted to practice Falun Gong as well, so he brought home videotapes of Master Li Hongzhi teaching the Fa. Mr. Zhang said, "I didn't know how precious the Fa was at that time, and I still smoked and drank while watching the videotapes. But when I was watching Lecture 7, I suddenly felt that the cigarette tasted very bad. It felt very strange and I extinguished the cigarette in my hand, opened another pack and lit up another one. But it tasted even worse. Quickly, I rewound the tape and listened to that part of the teaching again. I then understood the principle that a cultivator should stop smoking." Mr. Zhang had smoked for 20 years, but he quit smoking straight away and gave the remaining 20 cartons of cigarettes to his friends. He used to be able to drink a six-pack of beer with no problems, but later, he noticed that he could not drink much at all, and then stopped drinking completely.

Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance in his heart

Mr. Zhang dealt with a lot stress as a part of his daily job, which led to frequent pain in his back and neck. However, within two months after he started to practice Falun Gong, he felt light and relaxed, and his conduct has greatly improved.

He gave an example when he was issuing a traffic violation notice. He said that before he started to practice Falun Gong, he often had conflicts with the offenders, especially when he was not feeling well or felt frustrated. After he started to practice, he always remained calm and was kind toward others, put himself in the other person's shoes, even when the offender was angry, unreasonable or abusive. He said, "I was about to issue him a notice, which made him angry. This is a normal reaction from a person."

Before Mr. Zhang practised Falun Gong, his drinking sometimes affected his duty and he also ran late. But now, he regards himself as a cultivator all the time and tries to do well in all aspects of his life.

Clarifying the facts

On just about every day after work, Mr. Zhang goes to the tourist spot at Taipei 101 Tower to practice Falun Gong and clarify the facts to people. He said, "The two banners we have here play an important role. Once, a large tour bus stopped in front of the banners, and a crowd of passengers were slow to move. I was concerned that the tourists in front of the tower opposite the road could not see the banners, so I went over and knocked on the window of the bus. The driver got very angry and asked, 'What do you want?' I said to him, 'I'm sorry, but an Argentinian judge has given orders to arrest Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, Jia Qinglin, and Wu Guanzheng for their crimes in persecuting Falun Gong. We must pass this message to the people from mainland China. There are tourists from mainland China on the opposite side.' When the driver heard me saying this, he became very friendly and said, 'I know, I know' and drove the bus away. I felt that truth-clarification was really a magic weapon. One only needs to read the facts on the banners, and that is so powerful."

Only the evil is afraid of people knowing the facts

Mr. Zhang said, "Last week, while I was practicing Falun Gong, Mr. Wang came running over and told me that a young man was tearing up the banners. I immediately went over and saw that the young man had returned again. When he saw me and Mr. Wang, he started to run away. I caught up with him and asked him why he tore our banners. He became angry and said what we were doing was shameless and challenged whether we were legal. I read out the characters on the banners, and the young man immediately became timid and lowered his voice. I said to him, 'Do you know how many Falun Gong practitioners have been beaten to death? If you did not know what we were doing and had some misunderstanding, then it's our fault, and I should apologize to you. But you should at least find out first what we are doing here before you messed with our banners. Let me tell you, what we are doing is saving people. In China, several thousand Falun Gong practitioners have died due to the persecution. We are here to clarify the facts to the Chinese people. You must not mess with our banners again.'"

Mr. Zhang also said to him, "If you have any questions, you can ask any of the Falun

Gong practitioners here, and they will be very happy to tell you the facts. If you promise to never touch our banners again, then I won't pursue this case any further; but if you do it again, I shall call the police." The young man agreed.

There are many people like Mr. Zhang around the world, who became Falun Gong practitioners after they understood the beauty of Falun Dafa. However, the brutal persecution is still going on in mainland China. Falun Gong practitioners around the world are clarifying the facts to people, holding up display boards and banners, and distributing truth-clarifying materials. They are kindly persuading people to quit the CCP and its associated organizations, and exposing the persecution, so that it can be stopped as soon as possible.