Sophia Li, 15, joined a team of 25 youths to bike from Los Angeles to Washington to New York. She wants to help bring freedom to the people of China who do not have many basic rights that Americans sometimes take for granted.
In the Ride2Freedom bike tour, Sophia represents China. She lives here with her mother and grandmother, and she was born in China. In 2013 her family escaped to America.
To Sophia, being a refugee means they fled religious persecution in their mother country to seek political asylum. They did not simply decide to move to America. They were forced out.
Because of their belief in Falun Dafa (also known as Falun Gong), a peaceful meditation practice that follows the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance, Sophia’s family faced persecution in China.
“My grandma was actually put into a detention center, and that would be in 2000, so I was only 1 year old,” said Sophia. Later, her grandmother was forced to leave home to avoid being captured and detained again, after police raided her home and seized her Falun Gong books. “And all of this happened just because of this persecution, because of her belief...”
They left China for freedom of belief. The persecution is still severe. “Harvesting (of human organs) is still happening, and a lot of Falun Gong practitioners around me—they were jailed, persecuted, tortured, and beaten to death,” said Sophia.
