United States: Falun Gong Participates in Penn State's Homecoming Parade

On the evening of October 3, Penn State University held a large parade to welcome the students from America and other foreign countries. The annual parade is a tradition of Penn State University and is also the climax of the week-long celebration.

With nearly 50,000 students, Penn State is one of the largest universities in the US. The campus includes an additional 10,000 teachers and staff, and about 1000 students from China. Accordingly, the Penn State Homecoming Parade is one of the biggest university parades in the United States. The Falun Gong Club at Penn State applied to be in the parade so as to display the beauty of Falun Dafa to the people at Penn State.

The parade started around 5PM. Though the temperature was low, students, teachers and local residents were very excited about the parade and many of them came with the chairs and blankets to watch the parade even in the morning.

The parade was composed of 187 entries, including the famous Penn State Blue Band, and student organisations representing different countries. The Falun Gong procession was very eye-catching. After the leading banner "Falun Dafa in the World", it was the Chinese traditional Lion Dance that westerners loved very much. Next was a beautiful float decorated in lotus flowers and some practitioners sat or stood to demonstrate the five sets of exercises. Behind the float were the "Heavenly Maidens" with lotus flowers or flower baskets in their hands. The last section was the Chinese traditional Waist Drum performance. Banners of "Falun Dafa" "Truthfulness Compassion Forbearance" were woven into the procession.

Wherever the Falun Gong procession arrived, the audience applauded warmly and cheered loudly. Some followed the movement of the exercises; some people imitated the gestures of beating the waist drum. Some of them said, "The dances are so beautiful! The big lotus flower is so beautiful!" Many of them started to read the truth-clarification materials in the crowd immediately after the practitioners passed the flyers out. Some of them even helped to distribute the flyers for practitioners. Many Chinese students among the crowd took flyers. Some students asked detailed questions and some Chinese students were so surprised that they had their mouths wide open --- the Falun Gong practitioners they saw with their own eyes were so different from Jiang regime's propaganda and lies.