Zhou Xuefei endured more than three years of torture in a Chinese labor camp. She was so hungry she ate toilet paper, and was forced to remain in a squatting position for three days with her hands tied behind her back.

The young woman knew that Sam Lu, her husband of less than three months, had fled to the United States after her arrest, but she was not allowed to receive the letters he was writing from his new home in metro Atlanta.

Through 38 months of suffering, Zhou, 30, never gave up hope she would see her husband again, and Lu, 36, while working feverishly to gain her release, never doubted that his wife would someday be free to join him here.

"I could not," he said.

"I would not," she said.

On Thursday, her first day in Georgia, the woman whose name translates as Flying Snowflake said she was overwhelmed. She stayed close by her husband's side at a welcoming reception at the state Capitol.

"I am happy like a fool," Zhou said. "I am so touched and moved by everyone's support."

Zhou was arrested near her home in Shenzhen almost four years ago for passing out pamphlets on meditative exercises practiced by Falun Gong, the spiritual group outlawed by the Chinese government.

Lu had been arrested for the same reason and held briefly just before their wedding. After his wife's arrest, Lu fled their home in southern China and returned to the United States, where he had studied accounting five years earlier at Georgia State University.

He thought he would have a better chance of helping the woman he loved by leaving China, and began a letter-writing campaign to state and federal lawmakers.

He started a Falun Gong class at the Community Center in Smyrna near his home. He and friends continued to write letters and hold protests of Falun Gong persecution.

Mary Hook Silver, a Fulton County librarian and Falun Gong supporter, said she was touched by Lu's steadfast loyalty and love for his wife. She joined Lu at a march last summer in Washington, and wrote letters to her congressman seeking help with Zhou's release.

State Rep. Wendell Willard (R-Dunwoody), a recipient of Lu's e-mail campaign, passed a House resolution in April supporting Lu's efforts.

"I appreciate his persistence and passion to free his wife," Willard said before greeting the couple Thursday.

Lu believes his letters filtered through to Chinese officials, who released Zhou from the Sanshui Women's Labor Camp in January, because, they said, she had reformed.

Zhou said Thursday she was surprised because she had been asked to recant her beliefs two days before her release and refused. The camp director told her that her husband had worked hard to free her.

After Zhou's release, Louisa Assibi -a volunteer coordinator with the International Rescue Committee in Atlanta - helped Lu by filing paperwork with immigration officials. She said the two were lucky it took less than a year.

Zhou was granted political asylum and flew to New York on Sept. 11. The couple spent the last few weeks meeting with a Falun Gong group in Manhattan. They plan to return to the city Sunday, but Lu said his heart was in Georgia and they would return here to live.

Both admit they have changed since they last saw each other. Zhou said her husband was more patient and tolerant than she remembered. They plan to have a family someday, but Lu said his wife needed to recover from her abuse.

"The deeper parts of her are the same," he said. "Now I have my wife. I am a happy man."

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/northfulton/1004/01wifefree.html