(Clearwisdom.net) Part 2 of 4
Continued from Part 1: http://www.clearwisdom.net/html/articles/2011/5/23/125468.html
3. April 1993, Guangzhou in Guangdong Province
The first nine-day Falun Gong lecture series in Guangzhou was held in a hall at the Guangzhou Rubber Factory from April 13 to April 22 1993. Just a little over forty students attended this class. The host was the Baoling Qigong School in Guangzhou.
Master stayed in the factory's hostel that was very primitive. The hostel had a cafeteria that provided extremely basic and dull food. At one dinner, student A held up a bowl of rice with a couple of greens on top, and said he found it hard to swallow. His classmate from the military looked at the simple food in shock, and asked, “This is it?” When A turned around, he found Master had already finished the same food with a smiling face, and was ready to return to class. A instantly felt a surge of mixed emotions.
One time while we were all eating, Master said, “Here,” and placed a sunny side up egg in a practitioner's bowl. The practitioner looked up and we quickly covered our bowls with our hands. Two practitioners hurried away holding their bowls. The sunny side up egg was actually bought by another practitioner just for Master, for HIS hard work teaching. Master smiled at us in a fatherly way, and said, “Please eat. Each one of you has been working hard. Eat.”
One day after the lecture, Master smilingly said to the staff, “Let's dine out today.” Master led five students to a street food vendor's stand and each had a bowl of noodle soup with barbecued duck in it. If it weren't for us, Master would have never dined out. His usual meal was instant noodles.
During the nine-day lecture, Master took us to visit Liurong Temple (Six-Banyan-Tree Temple), which was built in 537. A pagoda sat at the center of the courtyard. When we walked under a lush banyan tree, we looked up and felt something special about it.
When the class came to an end, Falun Gong had established its root in Guangzhou. The principal of Baoling Qigong school was delighted. He kept inviting Master to come back to Guangzhou again.
4. August 1993, Guizhou Province
Master accepted the invitation from Guizhou Province Qigong Research Association in 1993. He went to Guiyang City for the second time to host a class between August 15 and August 21. I was fortunate to follow Master and attended the class again. We stayed at an inn. Each day we took a large number of lecture materials to the class.
Master's daughter Meige also joined us this time. She carried a big backpack filled with lecture materials. Whoever saw her carrying the heavy bag said, “It's too heavy for you. You are too young to carry such a heavy load.” Dragging her backpack with all her strength, she insisted, “I want to. I just want to do it.” At the end of the class, we stayed up all night to make graduation certificates. Meige stayed up with us and helped stamp each certificate.
During the class, one morning Master went to the practice site at Qianling Park. The site coordinator introduced the local practitioners' situation to Master.
Also during the class, the Assistant in charge of the Guizhou Assistance Center told the story about the snake that cultivated a human form. He was three hundred and twenty six years old. He tried to interfere with Master teaching the class. Later on he knew he was wrong. He sent his grand disciple to invite the assistant from the Guizhou Assistance Center to his cave, where he asked her to tell Master that he regretted what he did.
Before leaving Guizhou after the class ended, Master came to the staff room to see if we had packed our luggage. He lifted up some luggage to test the weight, and told us that we would benefit from the good habit of putting things back in order whenever we were done using them. He also showed us how to pack.
5. November 1993 and April 4, 1994, Anhui Province
The first nine-day class in Anhui was held in Hefei City on November 19, 1993. The host was the Anhui Province Qigong Research Association.
The location was at the Anhui Agricultural University hall. A total of about five hundred and eleven people attended the class, with only two hundred and sixty from Hefei city. The rest were a combination of veteran students from other provinces and high-ranking government officials from Anhui Province.
Master went to visit Jiuhua Mountain (a famous mountain in Anhui) on December 2, 1993. According to legend, Juihua Mountain was Di-Zang Bodhisattva's Buddhist temple, where the human bodies of three eminent monks remained intact even after hundreds of years. Master once said, “Take the three monks in Jiuhua Mountain for instance, their human bodies lasted hundreds of years. The reason is that their bodies have already been replaced by high-energy matter. In other words, those are not ordinary human bodies any more. Therefore they never deteriorate.”
Hiking up the mountain was physically demanding. Yet the higher we went, the merrier we felt. The floating clouds around us gave a feeling of being in heaven. Master said, “Now we are at the third layer of heaven.” All of a sudden many big golden shiny circles appeared out of nowhere. We felt as if we were in a fairy-tale world.
Some students felt thirsty after a while. One bought two cans of fruit for Master. Master took the cans and said, “I'm thirsty. Shouldn't you be as well? Come, let's share.”
Upon completion of the first nine-day class, one practitioner asked Master when He would come back again. Master smiled, and said, “Hefei, I will come back.” The local Qigong Research Association took the opportunity to extend the invitation for another class. Master agreed to give the second class the following year, on April 15, 1994. He predicted that by then fifteen hundred people would attend.
Indeed fifteen hundred people showed up at the second Falun Gong class held in the Hall of the Anhui Provincial Party School from April 15 to April 24, 1994. Once again the host was the Anhui Qigong Research Association.
On the first day of the class, the students were so excited that they applauded throughout the entire class. They often stood up to clap their hands. Some even raised their hands over their heads to applaud. Master said, “From this class on, we are going to teach the Fa. We will no longer follow the transitional Qigong format.” The gong Master sent out was so strong that even the most insensitive students could feel a powerful energy that pushed them back into their seats. When they concentrated on listening, they could no longer feel their bodies; it was as if they did not have any.
During the class, there was a student from the countryside. He was in his thirties and had a hunched back. One day he came to us all excited. He turned around to let us see his back, and said, “Do you see it? Do you see it?” His appearance was different. He urged, “Touch me. Touch my back.” So we did. Surprisingly, his back was normal. He tearfully said, “Last night in my dream, I heard a cracking sound. This morning when I got up I didn't pay any attention to my back. When I was washing up, my sister called out, 'How come your back is straight?'”
Master always wore an old navy suit and a fading shirt. After being washed many times, the shirt's collar and the sleeves frayed. A practitioner had a tailor make a new suit, and insisted that Master try it on and took a picture. The picture later became “Author's Recent Photo” in Zhuan Falun.
One day, we heard the exciting news that Master would dine with the entire class staff in Hefei that evening. Some non-local practitioners were as joyful as little kids. Thinking that they were all dusty and sweaty, they decided to take a shower and change to make themselves presentable.
We sat down at the table waiting for Master, imagining the wonderful meal we were going to share with Master. The food came – a big bowl of simple vegetable soup was placed in the center of the table, then bowls of plain rice and plates of the same vegetable were placed in front of everyone. We were in shock, and said, “This is it?” We were almost in tears. One student who sat right across the table from Master ate so quickly, he nearly buried his face in the food. After a while, he glanced up and saw Master carefully picking up a single grain of rice and putting it into his mouth. The student was greatly touched. Master treasured every single grain of rice. In order to awaken sentient beings lost in delusion, Master went through endless untold hardships. What Master ate was the plainest food one could imagine, yet what He offered us was the most precious.
(To be continued)