(Clearwisdom.net) With chapped lips, sunburned skin and sun-bleached hair, we are back from Eilat.
A few days before we left, I was seeing myself on a beach in meditation. At first I thought it was interference and a desire, so I tried to brush away those images. I spoke to a fellow practitioner about what I had seen and said, "What do you think about it, do you want to go to Eilat?" He said, "Why not?" So we took all the truth-clarification materials we had and hit the road.
Eilat is a resort city located on the shore of the Red Sea in the southern part of Israel. It serves as a tourist spot not only for Israelis, but for people from around the world. It is a great place to clarify the truth. We said to ourselves that the point of this journey was not to enjoy ourselves, but to save as many sentient beings as we could. We worked tirelessly, but were not tired at all.
Local practitioners helped us a lot. Not only did they welcome us, show us around, study the Fa with us, practice with us and even invite us to meals, but they also supplied us with very much needed truth-clarification materials in many languages. They also gave us lotus flowers, which we were very happy to distribute.
Our day usually began with listening to the Fa lectures when it was still dark, then we sent righteous thoughts at 7:00 a.m., then had a quick shower and we were off to the central beach to do the exercises. Then we gave out fliers to people and clarified the truth. After that we would start our truth-clarification activities in various spots of the beach promenade, where one of us would do the exercises, and another talked to people about Dafa and the persecution in China and collected signatures to stop the persecution. We also invited people to learn the exercises and showed them to anyone who wanted to learn. We gave out fliers in German, English, Hebrew, Russian, French, Arabic, Amharic and Chinese.
Here I would like to share a few experiences that made an impression on me. One time, while my fellow practitioner was doing the exercises, a young Russian man came by and I asked him whether he would like to sign the petition to stop the persecution. I clarified the truth to him. He listened to me very attentively and said, "If Falun Dafa is being persecuted right now, one day it will become a great religion. All great religions were persecuted in the past." Then he left. I was deeply moved by his words and just nodded in return. He was so young, but his understanding was deep. On another occasion, I was passing out a flier to a young lady, but she refused to take it and walked on by. A few minutes later, she came back and said, "I changed my mine, can I have one?" I gladly gave her a flier. One time, when we just started our activity, a young man who was managing a cafe approached us and said, "I read your flier. It [the persecution] is horrible. What can I do?" I suggested that he sign our petition and tell other people about the persecution. He signed it and took copies of the petition to his coffee shop to let his coworkers and others sign it too. He said he was a Buddhist himself and supported us.
One time, I saw a Hindu man who worked as a cleaner. I wanted to clarify the truth to him, but he could speak neither English nor Hebrew. He just smiled. I felt at a loss and wondered about what to do. Later, he approached us and just stood there watching Kobi doing the exercises. I tried to clarify the truth to him in sign language. I am not sure if it was successful, but I think he got the idea. He took the flier from us.
Sometimes when we practiced the exercises of sent forth righteous thoughts in public places together, teenage kids would harass us. Once, a kid threw a stone at my head while we were practicing, and on a few other occasions some kids yelled in my ear, trying to scare me. I know this was a result of my karma, but on those occasions I opened my eyes. Later, while performing the exercises on the beach promenade, some other kids tried to harass us, but I said to myself that no matter what happens, I am not opening my eyes. I also repeated "Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance" in my heart and soon those kids left.
On one occasion, while my fellow practitioner was doing the exercises, a group of 10 kids encircled him and started to make fun and speak loudly. I came up to them and said, "Do you know, that for doing those exercises, people in China are being severely persecuted? They are being put into labor camps and some have had their organs harvested while they were alive, just because they follow Truth-Compassion-Forbearance and practice those peaceful exercises." The young people all became quiet and I asked if they wanted to sign the petition. They formed a line and each one signed his name on the petition.
One time, when we just began our activity, somebody broke a beer bottle just where we were standing. The spilled beer in the scorching heat was causing a stench. I said to my fellow practitioner that maybe we should move to another place. So we moved to another place, but there too were some problems, and so we kept on moving until in the end we were tired and did not do anything else that day. Later, I thought about it and realized that it was interference and we should have endured it instead, rather than compromising our truth-clarifying activity. Many people did not know about Falun Dafa and the persecution. Many people thanked us for doing what we did. Whenever I gave out fliers, I always sent forth righteous thoughts and asked each person in my mind to carefully read the flier. Once, I saw a man walking with the flier for quite a distance and still not looking at it. I just continued to say in my mind: "Please, you have to read the flier, you must learn the truth and be saved," and when he was already quite far away, I saw that he opened it and started reading.
Sometimes people would say, "Yes, but what does it have to do with me?" Or they would say, "Why not focus on our problems in Israel? Why worry about China?" Or some would ask, "Why not support another cause, like saving dolphins or something?" I never argued with people, and would say, that yes, they are right, those problems are indeed very important and require attention, but what is happening in China is not unrelated to us, because we are all human. To Jewish people I would say, "Jews have gone through persecution, because the whole world was quiet and now Falun Gong is being persecuted in China. We must speak up, should we not?"
There are many stories to tell, but this is what I can remember now. On our last day, while sitting down after a long day, staring at the sky and listening to the Fa, I could hear a beautiful melody. Nearby was a soccer field that was fenced by hollow metal pipes. The blowing wind was passing through the pipes, making it sound like a wind instrument. It was so beautiful. I was no longer aware of my tired body or the rough ground; there was just the Fa, the night sky and the wind music.
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