Awakening Kindness in a Detention Center

(Minghui.org) I was arrested in 2016 for distributing informational materials about Falun Dafa. During a two-week detention, I made friends with the detainees and guards and helped them understand the facts about Falun Dafa. Below is my story.

I was held in a single cell after being taken to a detention center. It was July and the weather was extremely hot. Not only was the door and window of the cell closed, but the window was also covered with insulation film. Many flies were flying around the cell. Although I was very tired, I couldn’t fall asleep.

I spent most of the night sending forth righteous thoughts. At around 4 a.m., I heard a guard reprimanding another practitioner for getting up early to do the exercises. I sent righteous thoughts to eliminate the evil behind the guard. When he checked on me hours later, he was very friendly and even offered to turn on the air-conditioning for me. He also removed the insulation film from the window, so I could open the window to get some fresh air if I needed to.

I tried to clarify the facts about Dafa to other inmates during lunch time, but was stopped by another guard. I then sang a song about Dafa. A young man became interested and asked me about the practice. I told him about the benefits of Falun Dafa and how the communist regime has been persecuting it. He was touched upon hearing this information and said he would let people in his village know about Falun Dafa once he returned home.

There was another young man who had been scammed and wrongfully arrested. I told him about Dafa. He understood, and shouted “Falun Dafa is good, Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance is good” every day. Sometimes he began shouting the phrases early in the morning. I told him that he should be considerate of others and not disrupt their sleep. He agreed and said he should be following the principles instead of just shouting them out.

As I kept talking to the guards, many of them came to understand the facts as well. One of them said he would release me if he was the director of the detention center. The guard who had reprimanded the other practitioner for doing the exercises later allowed me to practice them. The viciousness in his eyes was also replaced with kindness. When I was released 12 days later, he urged me to protect myself and not get arrested again.