Overcoming Difficulties in a Forced Labor Camp

(Minghui.org) For 27 years, Master has taken care of me, and I am grateful for his salvation. I would like to write down my experiences of Master protecting me in a forced labor camp.

Destroying Slanderous Slogans in the Labor Camp

The day before the 2002 New Year, other practitioners and I made a great many small origami lotus flowers and filled our large bags with a lot of truth-clarification banners and materials. We were going to hang the banners and distribute the informational materials.

Two of us were seized as we hung a banner in front of the police station in our jurisdiction. We were taken to a detention center, but because we failed to pass the physical requirements, the detention center refused to accept us. A guard at the detention center called the police station and asked them to take us to the hospital for an exam, but no one came. The detention center then sought out the Municipal Public Security Bureau, and they came over.

I refused to go to the hospital. Two of them grabbed me by the arms and two by the feet, and they dragged me to the hospital. The doctor who examined me said, “It’s very serious. She needs to be hospitalized.” They then found acquaintances and told them to write up a fake diagnosis. They told the detention center guards that I was fine. I said, “They got a doctor to write a fake report.” But no one listened to me, and I was held in the detention center.

In May, I was illegally sent to a forced labor camp. After the doctor at the labor camp examined me, she refused to admit me and told the police to take me back. A female police officer insisted on getting me admitted so that she could earn a reward. It didn’t work out, and after many phone calls, in the end I was dragged back to the detention center.

After a while a man who looked like someone in authority came in and asked me, “Can you stop practicing? If you stop practicing, I’ll let you go.” I replied, “No. I haven’t broken the law, so why did you send me to a labor camp? Isn’t it good that we practice according to Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance? I don’t understand what the leaders of the country and you think.” A policeman taunted me, saying, “If you ask her about something else, she doesn’t speak, but if you want to talk about Falun Gong, she will not stop.”

The next morning, they took me to the labor camp. I asked to go home to see my father, who worried about me all the time and was not in good health. But the police did not agree, so I couldn’t visit him. When my father died, my son and my eldest nephew came to the labor camp with my father’s death certificate and asked if I could go home for the funeral. The labor camp staff member said, “Your mother is too stubborn.”

I was transferred to a four-person cell. There were words slandering Dafa and Master were plastered on the wall above my bed. I asked a fellow practitioner, “Who wrote that?” She said it was done to target a fellow practitioner. I thought to myself, “We must not allow words slandering Dafa and Master to exist here and poison sentient beings. Master was wronged, and Dafa was wronged.”

When the three other people in the room were asleep, I tore the words off and threw them on the floor. I then thought, “When they see the paper, they’ll just tape it up again.” So I picked up the pieces and put them in my pocket. I disposed of them when I went to the toilet. I knew that Master was helping me.

The next day, the captain asked, “Who tore those words off the wall?” I was sitting on my bed, and without hesitation I said, “I did.” She said, “Who told you to do that?” When I laughed and said, “No one,” she asked what I’d done with the pieces. I laughed again and said, “It was not good for them to be there.” She said, “No one dared to touch them for a long time, and you just showed up and tore them off. You are very daring! You must put them back!”

When I told her I’d thrown the pieces away, she wanted to know where. I just said quietly, “They’re gone.” She wilted all of a sudden, and said angrily “You wait and see how I will handle you!” She then turned and left.

That was the end of the matter, and no one punished me. I upheld Dafa. I knew that it was Master who was watching over me, protecting me, guiding me, and enlightening me.

We Were Forced to Have Our Photos Taken But Mine Was not Included

The labor camp took pictures of the Dafa practitioners and put them on their chests. When I was called, I said I wouldn’t submit to a photo. The guard said, “Why are you so special?” Two criminal inmates came over and dragged me away.

They pushed me into a corner, and two people restrained me. At the time, I thought, “No photo taken.” Just this one thought worked. The film was developed, but I was not in any of the photos. I realized that when a disciple has righteous thoughts, Master decides everything and will make the decisions for us.

“What Law Did I Break?”

In 2002, a group of people from the Municipal Public Security Bureau showed up at the labor camp. An older man confirmed my name and then asked, “Have you ever been to Beijing?” When I said I had, he asked if I knew that the state wouldn’t let me practice. I said, “Yes. It was because I was not allowed to practice that I went to Beijing. I thought that the central government leaders did not understand Falun Gong, so I went to explain the real situation and talk to them from my heart. Before I went to Beijing, I read in the law that citizens have the right to petition and the right to freedom of belief, so I was only fulfilling my rights as a citizen. But when we got to Beijing, we were arrested, and there was no place to speak up and be heard, so did we still have our rights as citizens?”

When he told me to sign the letter he’d brought, I refused. Two men came up next to me, and one of them tried to grab my hand. My diastolic blood pressure was sometimes only 40 to 60, and sometimes 30 to 50mm Hg. I had lost a lot of weight, and only weighed 60 or 70 pounds at that time.

I stood up at once so that they couldn’t grab my hand. I said, “What crime have I committed for you treat me like this? Is it wrong to be a good person according to Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance? Is my health bad?” It was Master who gave me this power. The older man stopped the two other men and let me go without signing the letter.

Under Master’s protection, I passed this hurdle.

Changes in the Guards of the Labor Camp

She Never Beat Dafa Practitioners Again

One day, the head labor camp guard told a fellow practitioner to sit on a small stool. When the practitioner refused, the guard slapped her twice. I lay on the bed crying. When the guard saw me crying on the bed, they didn’t hit her again and left.

In the afternoon, the head of the guards asked me, “Old lady, why did you cry when I hit her?” I asked her, “Why did you beat her? What did she do? Just because you are the guard, you can just beat people and hurt innocent people?” She said, “I told her to sit on a small stool, but she wouldn’t sit.” I said, “Sitting on a small stool is a form of corporal punishment. You know that. Why don’t you sit there and try it? Dafa practitioners all follow the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, and it is not good for you to treat us badly. You are still young and impulsive. I can understand you, but don’t do such things again.”

I whispered to her again, “Just do your work and earn your paycheck, but stop beating us. Dob’t you know that heaven judges everybody? How will you be judged? Falun Dafa is a Buddha school cultivation method. I have seen that you still have good thoughts, so I have told you this. You can just turn a blind eye at work and do not follow evil orders so closely. Then you will have a good future. Don’t be stupid. Do you understand what I’m saying? I’m really speaking to you from the bottom of my heart. Do you understand?” she nodded and walked away smiling.

As I write this, tears come to my eyes, because I am glad that she understood the truth. After some time, she came to me with an ear of corn and said, “I brought some corn from home and took just a bite of it. Then I remembered you. Do you dislike me?” I told her I did not dislike her. “I have to thank you,” I said. “If you didn’t think of me, I would never get to eat such good corn here.” After this, I never heard of her beating Dafa practitioners again.

Dafa Disciples Must Rectify the Unrighteous Environment

As we were sending forth righteous thoughts one day, a guard came in and slapped me twice on the back. When I asked her why she did that, she said, “What are you doing?” “Sitting,” I replied.

Because they’d discovered that we sat quietly and sent righteous thoughts every hour, they made trouble for us. First, I stalled her to prevent her from disturbing the others, and then I stopped her from hitting people casually so that she didn’t go to another room to bother other practitioners.

I went on a hunger strike for three days, which worried this guard. When another guard asked me why I was on a hunger strike, I said, “That guard beat me for no reason.” On the third day, she apologized to me and I started eating. After that the environment became much better, and she never hit anyone anymore.

One day, she went to hand me a big persimmon, and I said, “I don’t want it!” She said, “We wouldn’t be friends if we didn’t have conflicts. Take it, you’re welcome to it.” I said, “I hope you are nice to every Dafa disciple.” She said, “All right, all right. Here.” I took it and said everything was okay. After that when we sent righteous thoughts, she would look in at the door and leave without making trouble for us.

“Let’s Chat”

A criminal inmate in my room told me, “When we see the instructor guard, our legs and stomachs tremble.” But the instructor liked to chat with me. She said she could not fall asleep if she didn’t first talk to me at night.

When I first came to the labor camp, she had tried to “transform” me. She sent a few collaborators who’d given up Dafa and had been “transformed” to convince me. One of them slept in my room at night. As soon as this person entered the room, I sent forth righteous thoughts. Then she couldn’t stand it anymore. In the end, she couldn’t stay in my room. Sometimes she said, “Let’s chat.” I said, “I have nothing to talk about with you. Do you know what you’re doing? Dafa’s Master and Dafa have been slandered, and practitioners have suffered terribly. What are you doing? You are slandering us.”

Another one tried to read to me what they had written, but I refused to listen and started to send righteous thoughts. She couldn’t read anymore and stopped. She said, “We dare to go to hell for all beings. Do you?” I said, “Go to hell? There is no place for people like you even in hell.” She was startled and left.

They tried to convince me for three days but failed.

The instructor once told a criminal inmate to bring me five bags of soy milk powder as gift. Later, the instructor also brought me canned fish and pickles. I knew Master had arranged it.

I was released nine months early. When I got home, I found the instructor’s phone number through Minghui.org and went to her house twice. She said, “How do you know my number?” I said, “How can I not know your phone number?” I told her the truth about Dafa and asked her to treat Dafa disciples well. She was very touched and said, “You can stay in my house, and no one will arrest you.” I later heard from fellow practitioners that the instructor treated them much better. She had changed her bad attitude and treated Dafa disciples well.

In Memory of Fellow Practitioner Yin Ling

Our good fellow practitioner Yin Ling was a Dafa disciple on the 597 Farm in Shuangyashan, Heilongjiang Province. She was persecuted to death by the labor camp guards. Whenever I think about our experiences together, I cry.

We were jailed in the same cell twice. Yin Ling was 35 and I was 51. She was taller than me, about 1.6m or 1.7m (5'2” or 5'6”), a really fair lady, very good-looking. She was very diligent in her cultivation. Because of the persecution, her husband had divorced her, leaving her to raise their son on her own. Her son was only six years old when she was arrested that time. The child had cried and called out, “Mom!” but the policemen had no pity. They left the child alone in the house, took Yin Ling, and put her in a forced labor camp.

In the labor camp, Yin Ling wrote her son a letter, telling him, “Mother will pick you up when I get back. You must listen to your father.” Her letter was very touching, and the guards were moved when they read it.

The two of us studied and memorized the Fa together. When we got Master’s new articles, we would memorize and recite them together. When the police beat other Dafa disciples in the labor camp and we heard their cries, we would knock on the door and shout, “Don’t beat anyone!” in solidarity with the persecuted practitioner and to lessen the arrogance of the guards.

After some time, Yin Ling was transferred to another cell. When the practitioners in her cell were locked up in a solitary isolation cell for doing the exercises, she went on a hunger strike in protest. She was handcuffed to a bed and was unable to sit or lie down. A week later, her hands, feet, abdomen, and whole body were swollen. She could not walk, and her hands and feet were not working. Once, Yin Ling fell down and hurt her head. She couldn’t get up, but no one cared.

The second time, Yin Ling was assigned to my room because she couldn’t use her hands, so I fed her and cleaned her. She didn’t want my help, because I was weak too. I said, “Don’t think too much. We are fellow practitioners. You are very remarkable for protesting the evil and alleviate the persecution. We’re all one body, and this is what I’m supposed to do.” Although I could not move my left hand, I took care of her with my right hand.

We were together for six or seven days and then heard that she was going to be transferred to another cell. She said, “I’m not going anywhere. I’m with my aunt (referring to me). Only she can take care of me.” The police officer said, “She needs to be cared for herself—how can she take care of you?” I said, “I can do it!” but the police carried her away.

I never saw Yin Ling again. Four or five days later, I heard that she’d been carried out and taken home in a quilt. A criminal inmate said that her mother had come to pick her up. When her mother saw Yin Ling, she cried, “My good daughter, how did you end up like this?”

Ten days after Yin Ling got home, she passed away. I was still in the labor camp at the time, and when I heard about it, I cried bitterly. Such a good practitioner died as a result of the persecution, I will definitely cultivate hard, save more people, and speak up for Dafa and Master.