Australia: Sydney's Suburb of Manly Celebrates Falun Dafa Week

Sunday February 23, 2003 was celebrated as the beginning of the Manly Falun Dafa Week. Manly Beach is a famous tourist spot in Sydney. Between the docks and the beach, people could see the large banner of "Celebration of Falun Dafa Day" hanging from the Manly Corso Amphitheatre.

Tang dynasty costume show	MP David Barr accepts an interview

A painter practitioner gives two traditional Chinese paintings to the guests as gifts

At 11:30 AM, the celebration began. The Mayor Ms. Jean Hay and Member of Parliament Mr. David Barr attended the event and gave speeches in the rain. Mayor Hay stated that she felt honoured to be able to participate in the celebration of Falun Gong's "Truthfulness Compassion Tolerance Week." She expressed her appreciation for the practitioners' bringing "Truthfulness Compassion Tolerance" to Manly.

MP Barr said during his speech that the persecution of Falun Gong is shocking, and labelling a popular exercise as a potential threat is a sign of a dictatorship. He didn't believe that this is a threat to any party, though they may use it as an excuse. Mr. Barr expressed his support of Falun Gong, and he emphasised the importance of human rights and that people must have the right to freely express their opinions.

A practitioner and artist presented two guests with beautiful traditional Chinese paintings.

Next, the practitioners demonstrated the five sets of exercises accompanied by Dafa music and gave a Tang dynasty costume show. They also performed a dance to the musical piece "Pudu," sang in a chorus, played the electronic keyboard, and a western practitioner sang a self-composed song. The tourists and residents were attracted by the great performances. People applauded and said, "This is great! Very beautiful." Many of them took photos and recorded videos. When the performance started, the rain stopped. The performance completed at 2 PM.

In the Manly Library, dozens of large pictures composed the "Journey of Falun Dafa" photo exhibition. Falun Dafa introductory materials were prominently displayed in the hall. This was the seventh day of the exhibition, which started on February 17. People of all ages stopped to look at the photos from time to time.

The speaker played an introduction of Dafa during the entire time, "Falun Dafa is an ancient Chinese Qigong exercise. It follows the principle of the cosmos: Truthfulness Compassion, Tolerance. Falun Dafa's effectiveness in improving health and its profound principles have quickly made the practise immensely popular throughout the entire world. Falun Dafa can be found in over sixty countries, and there are over 100 million practitioners..."