Journey to Eradicate Cancer of Mankind

​

By Lotus King

 

Part I. Life in China

​

In this life, I was born inside of China.

​

I have two very good hearted parents who are typical Chinese intellectuals grown up in extremely harsh conditions. However, like the rest of the Chinese people in Mainland China, they became totally brainwashed by the Communist ideology and therefore were totally devoted to the goal of “Communism”.

​

To many people who believe in Communism, Communism is a symbol of an earthly heaven, where everyone is equal and everything is shared by all, and most importantly, there is no longer any human sufferings. Such a glorious goal is hard not to long for, for any human beings. So my young parents totally throw themselves into the various movements led by the Chinese Communist Party.

​

My father was pushed over his physical limits, leading to massive gastric bleedings that could have taken his life away. After his rescue, he was suggested to have two-third of his stomach cut out to avoid another such bleeding, in case he would be sent to a remote part of China to serve the Party. He feverishly agreed. Due to that operation, he never totally regained his health. Later, he followed the Party’s call to participate in street fights for different political opinions. In one fight, all of his fellow workers were burned to death inside of a truck. He was inside the same truck that day, but right before the truck took off, he was reminded to go get his helmet and when he returned, the truck had left. All these occurred around the time of my birth in 1967.

​

Even when I was inside of the womb of my mother, my live was already threatened by the Chinese Communist Party. In order to be a really good Communist Party Member, my mother decided that she would not waste time to raise another child. So she was ready to have an abortion. When she went to the hospital, the doctor told her that she had local herpes infection and therefore was not suitable then for an abortion. Upon hearing this news, my grandmother strongly protested against the abortion and that was how I was saved. I heard that my mother’s entire pregnancy of me was most torturous to her, forcing her not able to eat or drink any thing for many months. I was born one month before expected, right onto the Saint Valentine’s Day in the West: February 14.

​

Upon my birth, my father, out of his total devotion to the Party, decided to give me a name that totally conforms to the political era. The year of 1967 marks the beginning of the “Great Cultural Revolution”, which lasted for ten years, and will be remembered by history to be the most disastrous movement that aimed to totally eradicate all traditional Chinese culture. My father’s last name is Wang, which, in Chinese, means King, or Emperor. According to Chinese tradition, children should follow the father’s last name. However, only in special situations, children should follow the mother’s last name. In my case, there was a special situation. My mother, with the last name of Bao, was then the only daughter of the Bao family, since my mother’s brother, Bao Minzu, passed away in 1960, when China was suffering from the Grand Starvation, which was primarily caused by the Chinese Communist Party’s feverish movement called “the Great Leap”, making the Chinese peasants stop working in the field but start to live a life style of communism. My uncle, a young man ready to graduate from a teaching college and start a new family, upon seeing so many villagers died from starvation, rushed into the rain and caught an acute meningitis, and soon died from a high fever. My grandmother cried her heart out and dried all her tears, and eventually allowed herself into a deep depression that finally harmed her liver. Looking back, her later death from the so-called cancer is likely a misdiagnosis. She always wished death ever since the death of my uncle. After the death of my uncle, my mother became the only daughter, who, upon the marriage of my father, is considered to be the one to carry on the heritage of the Bao Family. So, according to the local tradition, all of my mother’s children shall have the last name of Bao. However, my father insisted that this daughter of his had to bear his own last name. This is the reason that my brother has the last name of Bao, while I have the last name of Wang. My father further decided to use my first time to praise the “Great Cultural Revolution”. So, my first time contains two Chinese characters, “Tong”, which carries a superficial meaning of red color known by modern people, and “Wen”, which is known to have multiple meanings, one of which means culture. Apparently, my father thought that his daughter arrives to the human world to be part of the “Great Cultural Revolution.”

​

However, heaven apparently has a different plan for me. As soon as I was born, due to my mother’s health started to deteriorate to the extent of potential death, I was shipped out immediately away from my parents and to be totally cared for by my grandmother in the Bao’s Village, a place far removed from all political struggles. Instead of being a part of the “Great Cultural Revolution”, I was under the care of this most wise Chinese house wife, my grandmother, who could not stop cursing the evilness of the Chinese Communist Party, since she was certain that her most beloved son would not have died, if not for the dictatorship and stupidity of the Chinese Communist Party. So, my first schooling was given to me by my grandmother, who taught me that Chinese Communist Party is evil, and that the traditional Chinese culture is most beautiful. She gave me total free space and time to be with nature. My most memorable time was those summer nights, when the earth started to cool down and all of the villagers arranged their dinner tables in front of their houses to enjoy the night time cool breeze, called “Chen Liang” (catch the coolness). Under the moon light and staring into a sky full of stars, my grandmother lay down next to me to tell me ancient legendary stories of China. Those were my lessons of traditional Chinese culture. During the days, I was allowed to simply ran around in the open field to catch frogs, pick melons, corns, fresh soy bean, or pick figs from the fig tree, which stands in the middle of the court yard of the family house. I was a little helper of my grandmother in feeding pigs, sheep, chicken, duck, goose and rabbits. The highlights of routine village lives are parades of weddings, funerals, as well as various traditional festivals. So, my early childhood was immersed in nature and in Chinese Traditional Culture fortunately survived inside of the heart of a strong-spirited Chinese grandmother.

​

Looking back, I am so very grateful to this great woman, who nurtured my young spirit and was my most important childhood teacher.

​

My grandmother loved to drink wine. When she was intoxicated by the wine, she was always crying. The sadness over the loss of her son totally took over her spirit.

​

When I grew to eight years old, I was taken back to the City, called Wuxi, by my parents. I missed my grandmother very much and was always longing for the summer vacation of the school, since I would be sent back to my grandmother during the summer vacation. My grandmother always gave me the most splendid smiles when I returned to her side.

​

On July 7 every summer, she would pick the green leafs from the Rose of Sharon and crush the leaves until all the green juices come out. Under the sunshine in the summer, she would start to wash my black hair with the green juice. She would tell me the legendary story of “the Cowherd and the Seventh Heavenly Maiden”. She told me that my hair will be as beautiful as that of the Seventh Heavenly Maiden when I grow up. She would then point out the sparrows in the sky and tell me that those sparrows were all flying to build the bridge in the heaven for the Seventh Heavenly Maiden to meet with her beloved earthly husband and her two lovely children, who she gave birth to on the earth. At the time I did not know that my life will unfold in such a way that the legendary stories of the ancient China are re-lived by myself again.

​

The reason that I put down so much details of my childhood here is because I do believe that if anyone wants to know who I am today, he or she needs to know this part of my life, since this part of my life forms the central core of all life events that later unfolded.

​

When I was in high school, my grandmother was diagnosed to suffer from cancer. The name cancer thus entered my life.

​

At the time, when I was holding hands of my grandmother and taking her for a walk, several months before she left this world, I was thinking very hard about what cancer is all about. She told me that cancer can kill her. In my young heart, I want to protect her and kill this cancer who threats to kill my most beloved one. But where is it? It is invisible. I could not see it and therefore did not know how to protect my grandmother. I remember I was looking everywhere around me. I was looking into the little plants that were passing my foot steps. Inside of my mind, I was calling out, “anyone of you can come to help my grandmother”. I knew plants have magic powers, since my mother’s liver disease was cured by Chinese herb medicine. However, no plants answered. Around the New Year of that year, I was called back to the Bao’s Village. When I entered the room, I saw my grandmother was surrounded by many familial faces covered with tears. When I held her hands and call out to her that I was back to see her, her tears rolled down her check while taking off to another world. That morning the sky was blue and the field was covered with a thin layer of frost. I rushed out into the open field and walked alone on the frost covered earth, listening to the crispy sound under my feet. It was the beginning of my journey to conquer Cancer, this invisible demon.

​

In 1984, prior to the University Entrance Examination, my family was approached by a visitor from the Nanjing University, which is one of the oldest University in China. My parents were given the promise that I would be unconditionally admitted into the Department of Biochemistry of this University, as long as I put down my signature on a form they provided. It was a major honor for me and a great relief for my parents, since the University Entrance Examination in China was very tough and accidental failure in such an examination would mean the total loss of future for a talented student. So normally no one would let go such an offer. My parents happily accepted the offer for me, considering that my elder brother Bao Jianxin was already there and could potentially look over a little for this younger sister. I was quietly making a different plan, however. Soon when the school offered application forms to me, I put down Shanghai Medical University as my top choice and did not even put Nanjing University on that application form. All three names of the Universities I put down were Medical Universities, since I was determined to become a doctor to cure cancer.

​

When my father learned the news that I let go of the guaranteed choice for Nanjing University, he was very anxious. I remember that night he scolded me out of his concern. I returned to my room weeping. He quietly entered my room and told me, “My daughter, I have thought it over. Whatever you like is what I like. It is alright for me that you made a choice of your own. I simply wish you success.” With that, I started to prepare for the college entrance examine.

​

The intensity of the stress made me sick to the extent that I could not eat nor sleep. Of course, my parents could not sleep either. They did everything they could to support me. I remember my mother was sitting next to me to use a hand fan to make breeze for me all night long, in order to help me to get a little bit of sleep. I was on the “battle field” for several days, and returned home with news of victory. On the last day, my father was waiting outside of the Examination Room, carrying a large water melon. That was for the final celebration of my victory. At the end of the summer of 1984, my elder brother took out a letter and smilingly put in front of my face. My dream of entering the Shanghai Medical University came true.

​

I spent four years in Shanghai Medical University. In 1984, the Communist China started to open the door to the free Western World. As a young college student in Shanghai, I felt for the first time the spirit of freedom. I spent much time in the library to read Western novels and books of philosophy. The Western World somehow felt more like my own home, when I was reading these books. I even felt that I could be the authors of these books, since the ideas in the books are so familiar to me. I started to write poems and also made a magazine of my own. The poems started to be published in campus newspapers and an assay was collected into a new book. I developed a kin interest in writing and knew in my heart that someday I would be writing a book of my life. My young mind was searching for truth of life.

​

One evening in the first year of medical school, I teamed up with several classmates to break into the room where corpses for anatomy were stored. When I was looking at the preserved human body, I looked at the young fellow classmate, who I was very much in love with, quietly in my heart, and I saw such a major contrast of life and death. The beauty of human life manifests so clearly in front of my eyes. This young man, who were dressed in a set of white sporty outfit, was so handsome. However, such a beautiful body, facing the preserved human body, I saw that he was heading towards aging and finally death. Why all beautiful things have to be eventually destroyed? What is the purpose of life, if the very end of all beauty and precious are heading towards an unavoidable total destruction?

​

One night, when I was sitting amidst many fellow university students, who were all in such a busy-minded state to prepare for homework or exams, I was having such a shocking question: why none of you are concerned about the foreseeable death several tens of years down the road, as if the world will be there for you forever? The very transient nature of this world simply started to bother me and made me feel so restless. It was a feeling of deep sadness about being a human that was pushing me to search for a way out. If everything is meant to be destroyed, then logically it simply does not make any sense why the human body is made to be so perfect, beautiful and complex, as if for a major purpose. What is the purpose then? That was the central theme of my intellectual pursue.

​

Emotionally, I was experiencing Love. Ever since when I was a young child, I was familiar with a kind of love that I always know. It was a form of love that is totally unconditional, selfless, so beautiful that anything else would appear pale in contrast. My heart was longing for such a love every moment of my life. I projected such a love onto several of my fellow classmates even starting in elementary school, in my memory. I was told by my elder brother that the most favorite game of mine when I was a little child of three of four was the game of marriage. Apparently, at such a young age, I was already projecting the kind of love of my heart out onto a marriage game. Life would be so meaningless if there is not such a love. However, deep in my heart, I also knew that I can not find such a love in this human world. When I quietly project this form of love onto this young fellow college student of mine, my heart experienced so much pain that was almost unbearable. One day, when I was walking on the road and looking for the shadow of his with my longing heart, I suddenly saw his face among every person walking by me. I suddenly realize that he is simply a human being like everyone else walking by me, and if I can love him so much, then I can also use this selfless love to embrace everyone else walking by me. From this experience, I realized that there is a higher form of love which can truly transcend ordinary. It is this form of love that I have been longing for and later I found it during my cultivation practice of Falun Dafa.

​

During my third year in the Medical University, I started to go to the hospital to learn clinical practice. One day I suddenly experienced severe stomachache. I was rushed into emergency room. I was diagnosed to have acute appendicitis and was immediately subject to operation. After the operation, I was put into a recovering room. There I met this beautiful young lady from Hong Kong. I was told that she was an actress and was recently engaged, but sadly was diagnosed to have breast cancer. Her handsome husband-to-be came to visit her routinely, and brought her delicious food of all kinds. I was alone in the hospital with no one to visit me. So she was always kindly offering me some of her food. We soon became friends. One day she asked me to take a look at her “cancer”, and I saw this ugly vicious looking large lump that were covering her chest. She looked so calm and beautiful, when she covered that thing up with her clothes. Soon I recovered and left that room, when she was out for a examination. So I did not have a chance to say good bye to her. Several weeks later, when I was wearing my white doctor’s coat to return to the hospital, this time, as a doctor-to-be, I entered that room and say hello to her. I was informed that she already passed away. I was standing there speechless. My heart felt heavy.

​

In the same semester, one day I was in the hospital and saw this young and handsome man standing there talking to a doctor. I stopped to look at him, because he was truly very handsome and I could tell that he was from abroad. Upon inquiry, someone told me that he was a musician from America and had to return to China for treatment since he was diagnosed to have liver cancer. At that time, he looked simply a bit thin, and his skin appeared very yellow. Shortly after that, I was sitting in my class at the University, I saw the picture of his dead body in front of my eyes, as teaching material of that class. His body was ready to be subjected to anatomical analyses. I closed my eyes. It was time for me to say good bye to medicine. But where would I go next?

​

In 1986, the first student movement started in Shanghai, and I participated in such a movement. Witnessing its start and end, I had a clear realization that as long as there is Chinese Communist Party, there is no future in China. At the time, the Shanghai City Mayor was Jiang Zemin, the same person later carried out the Tian An Men Massacre and the evil persecution of Falun Dafa. Jiang ordered crack down of that wave of student movement in 1986. In the summer of 1987, when I was restless at home during the summer vacation, a small magazine had a page which was offering “advice” by asking the readers to answer some questions. I had nothing to do, so I filled in the questions and received the advice, “Go Abroad” (to be continued).