United Kingdom: Practitioners Raise Awareness about Falun Gong During the Conference Weekend

On the weekend of August 25th, the "UK Falun Dafa Experience Sharing Conference 2007” was held. The day before the conference, many Falun Gong practitioners living outside London went to one of the capital's parks to demonstrate the Falun Gong exercises and raise awareness about the persecution.

In London, there are several fixed practice sites where practitioners teach the exercises voluntarily and do the exercises together. Regent Park, located in centre of London has the longest history as a practice site among them. For the past eight years, practitioners have been coming here doing two hours of exercises together every Saturday and Sunday. Now, it is not only an important practice site outdoor in London but also an important window from which the UK people come to know Falun Gong. Some new practitioners who have just started to practise come here to do the exercises. In addition, Falun Gong practitioners who have just come out of mainland China also find fellow practitioners here first through the internet.

On Saturday, Falun Gong practitioners from the UK met to practise the exercises together. At 2 pm, practitioners came in succession to the practice point under the big tree near the lake of the Park. It was a very nice day and the sun was shining. Many Londoners came to the park to enjoying the late summer sunshine, and many tourists also came. As usual, the practitioner responsible for teaching the practice voluntarily put Falun Gong leaflets on the lawn near the practice site for people to take at will. The peaceful music of the practice and the scene of practitioners doing the exercises together immediately drew people’s attention. Tourists passing by, one after another, stopped and watched and accepted leaflets. It was obvious that more people accepted leaflets than usual. It was not until the end of the activity that all material was distributed.

Not long after the practice started, an English young couple came saying that they wanted to learn the practice. They were Indian nationals. A practitioner asked how they got to know about Falun Gong. They said that one of their friends gave them a leaflet briefly introducing Falun Gong. After reading it, they wanted to learn, so they came to the practice site. These two young people especially that girl who was very quick at learning the exercises. They were so excited as if they had seen their friends who they had not seen for a long time. When leaving they told the coordinator of the practice site they would come and do the exercises together with other practitioners every weekend.

A family of three was nearby watching for a very long time while the practitioners were doing the second exercise. They said, “We live near the Chinese Embassy in London. We know Falun Gong and the persecution of Falun Gong by the CCP. We often see Falun Gong practitioners doing peaceful protests in front of the Chinese Embassy. We are very pleased to see Falun Gong practitioners here. We support Falun Gong and hope that Falun Gong practitioners will carry on doing it like this.”

A Chinese person who looked in his sixties initiatively asked a practitioner for Chinese material after standing near the practice point for quite a while. He left with delight when he got a booklet telling the facts about Falun Gong. Not very long, he came back again watching the practitioners doing the exercises for a long time.