4th June turned 21

Last night the 4th June movement turned 21. 150,000 people from Hong Kong, the PRC and even Taiwan celebrated her birthday and her adulthood. They celebrated her birthday and adulthood by bowing to those who died 21 years ago before the gates of Tien An Mun Square in Beijing. They died so that democracy in China might live.

The 150,000 people sat for about 2 hours. They sat in mourning. They stood up. They stood up for their rights. They stood up for those who could not stand up for their rights in China. They held up their candles in their little paper cups. They let their candles burn. They let them burn so that their light might be seen by the people of Hong Kong. They held up their candles so that they can be seen by the leaders of China. They wanted their light to be seen by people everywhere in the world to make it clear to them that the minds of the people of Hong Kong are still clear. They are still clear about what is true and what is false, what is right and what is wrong and what they want and what they do not want . They wanted the leaders of China to know that their hearts are not yet numbed by time: that they still twitch at the deaths of the heroes of democracy whose minds were as clear as theirs and whose hearts twitched at the lack of democracy in China. They also sang. They sang about the heoism of those who died. They sang about their sorrows. They sang about their hopes. They sang for their children. They sang for the early arrival of democracy in Hong Kong and in China.

I was one of the 150,000 who sat, who stood, who bowed to those who died, who held up their candles and who sang. I left in sorrow. But I also left in the hope that my sorrow will turn into joy for that day when China can finally announce to the entire world on the remparts at Tien An Man Square not only that the Chinese people have stood up but that they have stood up as the largest democratic nation in that world and not merely its largest factory! Our young men and our young women might have died 21 years ago. But their hopes and their dreams did not die with them.