3. Joke Caused Disaster

When I was under punishment, in chains and criticism, the cadre initiated all the prisoners to expose my sayings and behaviors at ordinary time. They also wanted to make use of this opportunity to find ways to increase my sentence. One day a female supervisor questioned me sternly: "Where did you hide your six children?" I was shocked and said: "I am not married, how can I have six children?" "Do you want to deny it? You told people that you had six children." She rebuked me loudly. I tried to recall what she meant. Then I remembered that when I first arrived at the jail, I did tell people this joke. I could only reply in a soft voice: "It was a joke." "Why?" She yelled as loudly as a lion. "Because they always wanted to introduce men to me. I felt so troubled that I told them I had six children." The cadre could not help laughing. However, she still insisted that I should turn in these six children and forced me to write reports. She made detailed inquiry about it every day.

I confessed to the Lord that I should not have joked about something which had brought myself to such a trouble, and I prayed to the Lord to deliver me. Finally, I remembered that my mother once mentioned that through physical checkup a doctor could distinguish whether a woman had been married or not and whether she had ever delivered children. This settled the issue.