On January 1, 2001, my elderly father and I went to Beijing to validate Dafa. We were arrested and detained in Beijing's Haidian Detention Center. Then, on January 8, we were taken back to the Huailai County Detention Center by the town head and a number of police officers that had traveled all the way from the town of Beixinbao in Huailai County, Hebei province, to bring us back. Eight months later, on August 27, 2001, my father and I were sentenced to two years of imprisonment to be served in the Jidong Prison and Shijiazhuang Prison, respectively.

Upon arriving at the Jidong prison I was interrogated by several people in quick succession. I was interrogated by Di Shijin, (branch prison deputy officer), Wang Guosheng (the executive education officer), Ma Lanchun (the executive prison administrator), and later by Huang Hao (the middle-team leader). They tried to find opportunities to wear me down through constant interrogation. Meanwhile, I took the opportunity to promote Dafa to them. A week passed with them having no success with me, and I could see that their evil nature began to emerge. Di Shijin was so angry with me that he took off his shoe and used it to slap me in the face. As for Huang Hao, he left the beatings up to the inmates. Their next approach was to brainwash me during the day by forcing me to watch propaganda videos or read materials defaming Dafa. During that entire time, I put myself into a state of "see as if see not" [From an unofficial translation of the poem "In the Dao" in Hong Yin]. Noticing that I was not concentrating on their brainwashing material, an inmate assigned to monitor me slapped me in the face, and quickly reported back to the supervisor. The supervisor called in more people and they read out loud materials defamatory materials to me. To prevent me from practicing the Falun Gong exercises, Huang Hao handcuffed both of my hands to a chair. If I needed to go to the toilet, the guards would only free one of my hands, and I had to drag the chair along with me. They would not let me sleep at night. When I dozed off a few times, Li Jingang and Shao Mingli, the two inmates assigned to watch me, quickly poured hot water over my head. Later, after seeing that they could not break my will that way, they poured scalding water over me directly from a thermos.

Thus, for eleven days, I was handcuffed to a chair with no sleep. My buttocks went numb and lost all feeling. Huang Hao then instructed an inmate to tie my arms and hang me up for an entire day, with my feet barely supporting my weight and causing my feet to swell up. Later that night, without giving me any time to recover from the previous torture, the guards handcuffed each of my hands to the handle of a different door. Then a few prisoners were asked to push the doors open. I felt my arms tearing away from me, and I went into convulsions because all my muscles were cramping up from the pain. The hospital report stated my heartbeat was high, and my blood pressure was measured to be 60-90 mm hg. After the incident, the team leader temporarily stopped the torture and allowed me to have two hours of sleep every night. However, as soon as I went to asleep, another form of torture began. One inmate sat beside me, lit up a cigarette and blew smoke into my nose through a rolled up paper funnel. He kept blowing until I woke up, choking from the smoke. [Note: Falun Gong practitioners do not drink or smoke] Sometimes, as soon as I would fall asleep, they would pour cold water on my face or strike me in the head with their knuckles. Aggravated by the fact that I still remained steadfast to my belief, Huang Hao locked me up in a solitary cell. Huang asked an inmate to immobilize my arms behind my back and then started punching me like a punching bag. I was severely hurt and blood spurted out from my mouth. The next day, they continued striking my face. That night, using a cigarette lighter, they burned my ear lobes, then stripped me naked and poured cold water all over me.

A few days later, Huang Hao summoned me to his office. Without a word, he grabbed my hair, and slammed my head against a wall and then onto his desk. He then asked a few guards to drag me up and drop me on the floor. Many times, he also shocked my head with a high-voltage electric baton and spit in my face. Still, I was not moved.

For a period of two months, I did not say a single word. Not knowing if something was wrong with me because I was not speaking, the deputy officer sent me to the hospital. The result of the hospital checkup was unknown to me, but later they sent me to Sanyou Hospital for another checkup.

By the end of March the branch team education officer, Wang Guosheng, and the middle team chief officer decided to send me and some other Dafa practitioners to the Shijiazhuang Prison, where my father was being held. They were trying to find more excuses to persecute me all the time. When they finally heard me speak, Huang Hao lined up about six people (former practitioners who submitted under pressure and now assist the evil to persecute determined practitioners) to try to talk me out of practicing Falun Dafa. I told them, "With all these lies, you know that you've committed a huge crime against Dafa." Upon hearing my remark, they kept quiet.

After sending me back to Jidong prison, Huang Hao again used the above mentioned people to talk to me several times, trying to get me to give up my belief. I briefly explained some contents of Teacher's articles, including "Path," "A Suggestion" and "Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. International Fa Conference" to them. With no success, they went back and reported to Huang that "Chen Aili would not give up his belief."

Later on, Huang instructed someone to read newspaper articles that slandered Teacher and Dafa. I told them, "Don't read any further. I won't believe those lies." They replied, "It's our job." I told them, "If you continue reading aloud, then I will too." I then cried aloud, "Falun Dafa is a righteous Way!" Thus for the rest of the day they tried overwhelm me with their reading. Later, they kept quiet and started recording the number of times I shouted that statement. Out of fear that other prisoners might hear me, they locked me up in a cellar. A prison officer came to visit me one day, "Aren't you tired, shouting like that every day?" I answered, "I'll carry on even if I am tired." Later, everyone in the prison seemed to know what had happened. They changed their attitude towards me and some of them even greeted me. I had been shouting for a whole month.

I recall that in early June of 2002, there was a prisoner who said to me, "You kept saying Falun Dafa is good, but why don't you practice the exercises?" That question awakened me. Ever since then, I began practicing the exercises, as well. The next day, however, one of the prisoners saw me practicing the exercises and reported it to the guard, who then tried to stop me by tying up my hands and feet. That night I went back again to repeating, "Falun Dafa is a righteous Way!" When midnight came, I stopped, out of the realization that my voice would disturb others' sleep. Yet, I still shouted out four times again during my sleep (I had found this out afterwards from a log). The next day, instead of the usual six, the prison sent 15 people to monitor my every move. I protested their unreasonable actions with a hunger strike.

Five days after I had gone on hunger strike, Sanyou Hospital sent some people over to force-feed me. They purposely left the feeder in my mouth for one whole week, after which I noticed that even the color of the feeder had changed from yellow to black. I lost my voice as well. Forty-five days after starting my hunger strike protest, Huang decided to keep me occupied by asking me to stitch up soccer balls, which I refused. I told him, "I've done nothing wrong and I'm not required to do any labor."

Finally on January 8, 2003, I was released. My father was also released at the same time. Before I returned home, I was first taken to the "610 Office," where one officer named Yang asked me, "Do you still want to practice?" I replied firmly, "Of course, it's such a wonderful thing!"