“They are killing us," the students screamed agitatedly!” Many were covered with blood. Jian took three hits to his right leg. Other students grabbed his arms and carried him to the Folk Heroes Memorial in the middle of the square.
Jian was in charge of a group of individuals that had formed to keep order and render first aid at Tiananmen Square. One of the group's foremost tasks was to prevent the soldiers from getting closer to the square. He first couldn't believe what he had just heard, thinking the distant lights he saw were from streetlights.
Jian and more than 200 of his helpers quickly went to the square's western edge. A few moments later he saw the soldiers' shiny helmets in the distance. His group advanced, but he saw more and more students and Chinese civilians retreating. The students' cry, "they are killing us!" made him shudder. Many were covered with blood.
"By 2:00 a.m. I saw eight soldiers and an officer approaching us. I walked a few steps forward and shouted, "We are students and unarmed. The officer looked at me and began shooting without warning."
Jian took three hits to his right leg. Students grabbed him by the arms and took him to the Folk Heroes Memorial in the middle of the square. From there he was taken to Beijing's Tongren Hospital.
Twenty years later this scene is as fresh as yesterday in the mind of the now 38-year-old political commentator. Since his flight from China, he has lived in exile in Paris. He had left the last bullet in his leg until 2008, 19 years since the blood bath. It was his way of remembering his part in history's making. He also wanted to accomplish one other thing—to prove to the world that "The soldiers were the ones who had opened fire on the unarmed students. Contrary to CCP [Chinese Communist Party] propaganda that does nothing but lie to the world, no matter what opportunists such as the then well-known student movement leaders Hou Dejian and Liu Xiaobo told you at Tiananmen Square."
I first met Jian on May 20th, 2009 at Jannowitzbrücke in Berlin. He was with seven friends, one of them, Wang Menglong, from that historic era, and was accompanied by the well-known Chinese rock band Paigu. They were headed for the Chinese embassy. The group had toured ten cities in France, Italy, and Germany since May 15th, to commemorate the victims of June 4, 1989.
I was a bit nervous, but then felt connected to him, because I had also actively participated in that event from 20 years ago. I had been in Beijing between May 30th and June 7th, 1989, to participate in the events. Had I been at Tiananmen Square that night, who knows what could have happened to me? I did experience several things and also firmly believed the blood bath had happened, although since the morning of June 4th, we heard nothing but propaganda that denied any of this had occurred. Jian's memories moved me.
"Today we attempt to rouse your rotten souls into awakening in a new way, with rock music!" screamed Wang Menglong into the microphone at Jannowitzbrücke. He was a drama student at Beijing's Theater College, and is now 42 years old. Along with other students, Menglong gave daily speeches at the square prior to the massacre. "We heard the first shots," he reminisces. "To frighten the students, the officials alternately turned the street lighting off and on. Then, I saw the tanks approaching. They approached the tents that housed the replica of the Statue of Liberty the students had built, and their sleeping areas, right where I had slept. The tanks rolled over the tents and killed numerous students. Menglong also lives in Paris in exile.
Tiananmen Square connects Jian and Menglong to this day. The new tune, "Tiananmen Brothers," expresses their deepest thoughts about all the students who died at the square. They sang together before the Chinese embassy in Berlin.
Read the Original German Article: http://www.epochtimes.de/articles/2009/06/03/453222.html
