United Kingdom: Falun Gong Practitioners Take Part in the Golowan Festival in Penzance, Cornwall (Photos)

The Golowan Festival, held in Penzance, Cornwall, is a well-known arts festival held in the southwest of England, at the end of June each year. This year, Falun Gong practitioners took part in the 2008 Golowan Festival, bringing the peacefulness and goodness of Dafa to the local residents and visitors to Penzance.

Practitioners demonstrate the Falun Gong exercises by the seaside in Penzance

The Falun Gong information stand

Located in Penwith, the most southwest point of England, Penzance is a popular coastal tourist spot. The purpose of holding the Golowan Festival is to promote the traditional culture of Cornwall. In the Golowan Festival parade, primary school students from Penzance and neighboring areas dressed up in various traditional costumes. This year, Falun Gong practitioners were invited to be part of the festival. The practitioners celebrated the festival with locals and also set up a Falun Gong information stand to introduce Falun Gong and to tell people about the genocidal persecution of Falun Gong by the Chinese Communist Party.

Falun Gong practitioners take part in the parade

The Golowan Festival parade was held on June 28 this year. The parade is an important annual event in Penzance and attracts numerous local residents and tourists. Thousands of spectators were massed along the parade route. The Falun Gong team was led by a large yellow banner reading, "Falun Dafa Is Good." The banner was immediately followed by practitioners performing the lion dance and playing waist drums. Accompanied by the sound of drums and with smiles on their faces, Falun Gong practitioners displayed high spirits. Their liveliness was infectious and many spectators kept applauding and waving to the practitioners, or shouting, "Lovely!"

Spectators were thrilled to receive the delicate paper lotus flowers offered by the practitioners. Each paper lotus was attached to a bookmark printed with "Falun Dafa Is Good," and "The World Needs Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance" in English and Chinese. Upon receiving the bookmarks, many people read aloud the printed message and quite a few of them also learned how to say the words in Chinese.

The parade through the city lasted for two hours. Throughout the parade, the practitioners delivered good wishes to people in southwestern England, with the message, "Falun Dafa Is Good." At the end of the parade, people gradually left, bringing home 2,000 lotus flowers and countless good wishes.

The next day, June 29, a Falun Gong information stand was set up in the Festival area. Practitioners were busy introducing Falun Gong and telling people about the nearly nine-year persecution against innocent Falun Gong practitioners in China by the Chinese Communist regime. Meanwhile, a group of practitioners demonstrated the exercises along the seaside walk in Penzance to introduce Falun Gong to more people.

Many passers-by stopped to watch the peaceful Falun Gong exercises, read the leaflets and ask questions about Falun Gong. Some people even sat down, watching the practitioners for half an hour.

One woman expressed her interest in learning the exercises. Though Penzance is in the remote southwest of England, there is a local practice site where practitioners do the exercises and offer voluntary teaching every morning. After the woman said that she did not live in Penzance, she was delighted when practitioners told her that she could download free Falun Gong books and the exercise teaching VCD from Falun Gong websites.