Germany: Seizing the Opportunity to Tell People about the Persecution of Falun Gong in China

Recreational buildings can be found all over Hanover and its suburbs. Many different groups meet there regularly for leisure activities, such as music, art, theatre and many more.

April 10th was an open day with more than 59 groups participating in activities which were enjoyed by the public. There was music, plays and dancing accompanied by good food and drink.

North German Falun practitioners participated in these activities because they tend to use this building for experience sharing meetings. Cultural activities, sponsored by the city government in such buildings, are acknowledged and supported by politicians. On this evening, the Mayor arrived with reporters.

The Falun Gong group was given a small corner of the large hall. We did our best to arrange everything carefully and conserve space. Above the middle of our information table we placed a poster that showed a European practitioner in the meditation position and immediately next to her a Chinese lady who was being strapped down and tortured by two policemen.

We also displayed the beauty of Falun Gong with photos of dancers in traditional Chinese costumes along with pictures from experience sharing conferences and large-scale group practices in China before the persecution began. We placed paper lotus flowers in many colours on our information table where we showed a video of Master Li Hongzhi, founder of Falun Gong, demonstrating the exercises.

To our surprise, we found that the large area directly next to us was not occupied because another group did not show up. We could demonstrate the five sets of Falun Gong exercises in full view of many people who were sitting at near-by tables enjoying a cup of coffee.

The kind-hearted and harmonious atmosphere of Falun Gong could be felt everywhere. A stream of people constantly passed our information table. They gladly accepted our leaflets and often stopped to ask questions.

A group of ten-year olds eyed the posters curiously. These children were shocked by the scenes of practitioners being tortured in China and did not hesitate to ask detailed questions: “What did this woman do? Why is she tortured like that? Is this legal?”

A girl of African decent, who spoke beautiful German, assumed the leadership of the little group. Later we noticed that she brought all her friends, one after the other, as well as her mother and her mother’s friends to our stall. She told them about the persecution. At the end of her impromptu presentation she said loud and emphatically that in her opinion god will punish the torturers very soon.