THOUSANDS practise the Falun Gong method of qi gong every day in the northeast city of Changchun despite government criticism of a protest by 15,000 members in Beijing two weeks ago and a sales ban on books by founder Li Hongzhi.
Visitors to Changchun, the capital of Jilin province where Mr Li first propagated his theories, said that each morning thousands of his disciples gather in public areas to do an hour of exercises.
One said that in a big square in front of a giant palace built for Pu Yi, emperor of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo, about 300 disciples gather at 5am in front of a sign saying 'falun da fa' (the great system of Falun), outnumbering several other groups doing qi gong or physical exercises.
'We do the exercises every morning at this time for an hour,' one retired woman said. 'We study Li's works in the evenings. He has 100 million followers worldwide.' Other groups gathered in parks, squares and on the side of the roads.
But Mr Li's writings and tapes are no longer available in the bookshops. The owner of a street-side stall said officials from the city's Publication Bureau confiscated all the copies a month ago.
'There are none in state shops now, you will only find a few under the counter,' he said. 'I estimate his followers in Changchun at about 10,000. They are good-quality people and the exercises help their health and spirit. What is wrong?' Changchun is where Mr Li made public his theory in the early 1990s. He was born in Gongzhuling, a farming town of about 100,000 people 50km south of Changchun. From a poor family, he had little formal schooling and joined the PLA.
