(Clearwisdom.net) Ms. Li Yujun, 50 years old, is a Falun Gong practitioner in Haining City, Zhejiang Province. She also has excellent skills as a tailor. Because one of her parents had been an official within the Nationalist government before the Communists took over China, she was denied proper schooling opportunities while growing up. Since beginning the practice of Falun Gong, Ms. Li Yujun has followed the Fa closely and practiced diligently.
In 2001, because she persisted in practicing Falun Dafa, the authorities unlawfully sent Ms. Li Yujun to a forced labor camp for two and a half years. She was detained at Moganshan Forced Labor Camp but decisively resisted their effort to "reform" her. Later, she and several other practitioners were sent to a Brainwashing Center at Shiliping Labor Camp. During the two-week intensive brainwashing, the other practitioners were swayed, but Ms. Li Yujun remained resolute in her belief .
Shiliping Labor Camp police had no choice but had to send her back to Moganshan Labor Camp. They then confined her in a cold, damp, underground isolation chamber under Mogan Mountain. In the icy December weather, with only the thin exercise outfit she was wearing at the time of her arrest, Ms. Li Yujun was exposed to freezing cold, as the cell door was left wide open for the northern winds to blow in. They also constantly broadcast lies slandering Master and Dafa through high-volume speakers. Ms. Li Yujun shivered in the cold, and the high-pitched speakers made her dizzy. With only a cotton blanket to keep warm, she suffered and survived nine days of torture. Later she was confined together with two other practitioners, but all three of them were "sandwiched" by criminals detainees charged with monitoring the practitioners. The camp police tried to tear down the practitioners' will by separating them and denying them personal contact or communication.
In February 2003, there were three large snowstorms, with temperatures dropping to 15 degrees below zero. The damp cold in the South could be worse than that in the North. In this terrible weather, Ms. Li Yujun still did not give in. She was forced to sit on the icy cement for more than two months, because the camp guards would not give her a chair. Earlier, because she had refused to march in line, the guards directed other criminals to beat her, causing damage to her lumbar vertebra. That older injury was never treated. The freezing drafts made her back hurt so much she could not sit straight. On the coldest days, Ms. Li Yujun could not sit at all. She just picked up some pieces of paper and tried to put them under her hips as padding. But immediately the criminal monitors rudely forced her to take the paper away.
During this torment worse than death, Ms. Li Yujun finally realized, "I am a practitioner. How can I sit idly and wait for death! Why not practice the Falun Gong exercises?" With her head held high, she said solemnly, "My body is ready to give out. I have to practice Falun Gong." The criminals in charge of her were at loss as to how to handle this and rushed to the camp guards. Other criminal monitors came running quickly and, porters as well as guards charged into the room. Loud curses and berating voices echoed in confusion in the room. Meanwhile, Ms. Li Yujun sat, her legs double-crossed and with a tranquil and peaceful expression on her face, as if the surrounding chaos had nothing to do with her. At that moment, life or death was out of her mind. Her powerful energy shocked the guards. They forcefully separated her legs and took her to the office. After long negotiations, the guards gave in. But later in April and May, while forcing her to listen to the slanderous audiotape, they again refused to let her sit down and made her to stand up 15 or 16 hours at a time, day and night.
The guards selected a young criminal named Hu Ruixue and arranged for her to monitor Ms. Li Yujun closely. Although young, Hu was extremely brutal and unreasonable. Ms. Li Yujun always tolerated Hu with benevolence and patience.
One morning at breakfast, because Ms. Li Yujun had not finished eating the Chinese bread rationed to her, Hu slyly suggested to Ms. Li that she hide the leftover bread in her pocket to eat late at night, when she was hungry. As soon as Ms. Li pocketed the bread, Hu went to the camp guards to report Ms. Li for hiding bread. The guards came and rudely searched Ms. Li, cursing her for violating the camp rules. They then used that excuse to extend her term of confinement at the labor camp.
Ms. Li Yujun was constantly forced to stand at attention as if in military training, while being forced to listen to the Dafa-slandering audiotapes. Because she had to stand up all the time for two months, Ms. Li Yujun's feet became so swollen that she could not wear shoes. To make things worse, Hu would hide Ms. Li's shoes and force her to march in line, claiming she needed the exercise. When Ms. Li refused, they tied her hands and legs and dragged her along.
Because she was watched so closely, Ms. Li could only take a shower once a month. Her hair was so dirty that a comb was not able to go through it. Sometimes, when washing her face, Ms. Li poured a few drops of dishwashing detergent onto the towel to slightly touch her hair. Then the ever-vigilant Hu would jump on her and cite the camp regulation that in washing the face one should not wash the hair. At the direction and instigation of the camp police, Hu was always verbally abusing Ms. Li.
Yet Ms. Li Yujun would always counter these despicable acts with benevolence. Every morning as she cleaned the restroom, she would drink some tap water so that she could avoid troubling Hu for drinking water. Every night before bedtime, the camp police only allowed the detainees ten minutes to wash their face or to clean their feet. Ms. Li did not have enough time to do both. It was either head or feet, one thing only. Sometimes just a quick cleaning of the socks would take up to ten minutes.
Every day Ms. Li would have to suffer Hu's mischief such as wasting a half a bowl of rice made of the leftovers from each detainee or throwing away half a bowl of the pickled mustard green soup. Ms. Li would then calmly eat the leftovers from her meal. Sometimes, Ms. Li would patiently try to persuade Hu to become a nicer person. But Hu was lost, and her soul was sold for the reward promised to her by the camp authorities.
One morning the monitoring criminals surrounded Ms. Li Yujun, as was usually arranged by the camp guards. As they started to read a book slandering Falun Dafa, suddenly Ms. Li cried out loudly, "I don't want Hu Ruixue. I don't want Hu Ruixue." The porter at the door and the camp police ran into the room in a hurry. They forced Ms. Li into the office, while Hu was so scared she turned pale and was stunned. Later the camp guards came to tell Hu to move to another group. The other two criminal monitors were pleased by this good news, because they too disliked Hu's bad deeds.
Ms. Li Yujun disdained the rumor mongering and finger pointing that went on in the camp and did not pay any attention to it. Although she was uneducated, magically she could understand well in her heart every word of Falun Dafa. Even as she suffered the inhuman physical punishments and forced brainwashing, her heart was full of brightness as she used her own righteous thoughts to act righteously in clarifying the facts and validating Dafa.
Everyday, besides cleaning up the room, Ms. Li had to take care of the restroom. The rest of time, they would try to brainwash her or would physically punish her by making her stand at attention. This was nothing to her but just more suffering. The camp police knew that they could not "reform" Li Yujun, so they tried harder and harder.
Moganshan Labor Camp was responsible for processing cigarette lighters and working on clothes. Other camps made sweaters, bathroom curtains, or sewed clothing. For the cigarette lighters, the camp required every detainee to produce five pounds worth of lighters per day, but practitioners that refused to renounce their belief would have to complete seven pounds. They knew well that the seven-pound workload would be impossible to finish, and that this could serve as a good excuse to extend the practitioners' term of detention. Comparing the physical labor to the physical punishment or the mental suffering of listening to lies or the forced reading of slanderous books, many other practitioners would take the workload. But Ms. Li Yujun refused to do any forced labor, and this really annoyed the camp authorities.
Ms. Li Yujun became the only detained practitioner who would not do any forced labor. Camp guards and other criminals instigated by the camp police tried to force her by beating, hitting, and cursing her, but Ms. Li would never compromise. Female guard Tang Lili once grabbed Ms. Li's neck and dragged her over to two other practitioners working on the cigarette lighters. The guard yelled at her, "What are they are doing and what are you are doing? You are just here goofing off for free meals!" Ms. Li kept quiet, but her heart was clear with her own righteous thoughts.
From day one of the persecution in Moganshan Forced Labor Camp, her personal life or death was not very much on Ms. Li Yujun's mind. Most of the time, she would think of how to validate Dafa. Although she did not have formal schooling, her mind clearly understood that she was being forced into this evil den unwillingly. Whether she got to eat or not, she definitely would not do what should not be done by a Dafa practitioner! She would only do what a practitioner must do.
For more than a year, the camp authorities tried every despicable tactic, but they failed to move Ms. Li's rock-solid determination. Later, the camp guards continued to curse her but let her be herself. No one wanted to be liable for her death if Ms. Li Yujun died in the camp.
Finally, after two years and six months, Ms. Li Yujun walked out of the Moganshan Forced Labor Camp. Now she is back and merging into the mighty current of Fa-validation to save the sentient beings.