France: Celebrating the First Anniversary of Fontenay-sous-Bois Falun Dafa Day

Fontenay-sous-Bois is near Paris in France. Last year it announced March 2nd as “Falun Dafa Day”. One year later, Mayor Jean-Francois Voguet sent a letter to Falun Gong practitioners to declare once again his support for Falun Gong, and to encourage Falun Gong practitioners to hold celebration activities as well as a parade in both the new and the old city areas.

On the afternoon of March 2nd, the practitioners came to the city hall early, hanging up banners reading “Falun Dafa”, “Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance”, and “Falun Dafa Day”. Colourful balloons complemented the joyful atmosphere. Both Chinese and western female practitioners wore traditional Chinese clothes, which also added to the beautiful scene.

The celebrations began at 2:30PM in front of the city hall. A Falun Gong practitioner made the first speech thanking the Fontenay-sour-Bois city government and people for their support. Another practitioner read out the support letter written by the Mayor. One female city government official gave a speech welcoming the practitioners to the city and hoping that everyone would enjoy the celebrations. The French Green Party also sent a representative to attend the celebration, who declared once again the French Green Party’s continued support for Falun Gong. The representative strongly condemned the wickedness of the persecution on Falun Gong and its practitioners by the Jiang regime, calling on urgent intervention from all countries to stop the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners.

Female practitioners, dressed in traditional Chinese clothes, demonstrated the graceful and peaceful Falun Gong exercises as well as the Chinese fan dance and lotus dance.

Around 3pm, the dancers headed a celebration parade, singing the song “Falun Dafa Hao”. Nearly one hundred practitioners formed the main body of the parade, passing through both the new and old city areas in Fontenay-sous-Bois. The parade lasted 3 hours and brought the goodness of Falun Dafa to thousands of people. Some practitioners’ friends attended the celebrations from beginning to end.

Many passers-by were surprised by practitioners’ stunning performance. They exclaimed, “Wow! It’s extremely beautiful!” Some people said to their children, “Look, how pretty!” It was a cloudy day and there weren’t that many people on the streets. However, many drivers passing by opened their car windows and asked for a leaflet. Practitioners spoke to store owners and residents and many people enjoyed the performance through the open windows of their homes, waving their arms in greeting to practitioners. Children on the streets happily took colourful balloons reading “Falun Dafa Hao” [Falun Dafa is Great]. There was one person who saw practitioners put a leaflet into his mailbox and thanked them with Heshi [a traditional Chinese greeting of putting the hands together and bowing] through his window. One practitioner met a good friend who told him that she knew the truth about the Jiang regime’s cruel persecution of Falun Gong, because when she went to a big city in China, she had witnessed how brutally the police treated people who were detained in the local police station.

Although the weather was not perfect and there was even rain and clouds at times, the practitioners’ pure hearts and righteous thoughts and actions meant that everyone had a good day and the activities were very successful.

Chinese version available at http://yuanming.net/articles/200303/17937.html