(Clearwisdom.net) Longwood Gardens is a world famous park in the west suburbs of Philadelphia. It attracts about 100,000 visitors every year. From October 30 to November 21, 2004, there is a Chrysanthemum Festival in the park accompanied by exhibitions of Asian traditional culture, music, acrobatics, dance and martial arts performances. On October 31, Falun Gong practitioners of the Greater Philadelphia area were invited to perform at the festival.

The weather was very good. At the Fountain Garden, several dozen Falun Gong practitioners dressed in bright golden yellow exercise suites performed on traditional waist drums accompanied by joyous music. Next, they demonstrated the five sets of Falun Gong exercises. The movements were tidy and orderly and the environment was peaceful and serene. The demonstration attracted many people and some of them began to follow along with the exercises. Many other visitors asked for information on where the exercises were being taught and bought the books and exercise teaching tapes.

After watching the Falun Gong demonstration, one woman said that she enjoyed the performance. She said our demonstration gave the audience a lot of information and the movements were beautiful. She said the audience enjoyed it very much. She had heard about the persecution of Falun Gong in China but didn't know what Falun Gong was. She said that now that she knew what it was, she was interested in it. She believes the persecution of Falun Gong is unjust and stupid. "There is no reason to persecute it." She said.

Another woman had practiced Tai chi before. She said she liked the Falun Gong performance. It was similar to Tai chi but also different. It was very peaceful, serene and wonderful. She said she had read about Falun Gong in the newspaper and she thought there was no reason to persecute it in China. The persecution sounded very misguided to her.

"The performance is great! And the costumes are outstanding, too," said the manager of performing arts at Longwood Gardens. She continued, "The audience looked as if they enjoyed the performance. We hope you will come to perform again next year."