Recent photo of Hu Xiaoguo
I am Hu Xiaoguo, live in Gaofeng Village, Xinglongjie Town, Zizhong County, Sichuan Province. I am 47-year-old and has primary education level. About ten years ago, I joined the Disciples Sect and played in a farce about ascending to heaven, for which I feel regretful today.
Encouraged and persuaded by my eldest sister Hu Suqin and third eldest sister Hu Suhua, I joined the Disciples Sect in June of 2002. Reportedly, joining the cult and spreading gospel were helpful to cure disease, to expel devils, to get blessed and go to heaven after death. Since then, I had eaten the “food of life”, which meant weighing grains before cooking to ensure the amount not exceeding two Liang for each day, and performing prayer before each meal. I deeply believed in existence of the God and Fairy, dreaming all day long about going to heaven. During the later period, I concentrated my energies on attending activities of Disciples Sect. Later I became a director. Then I thought about seeking death in order to go to heaven as soon as possible.
After I joined the Disciples Sect, the originally poor relationships between my wife and I got increasingly strained. We often quarreled. My wife requested for divorce. Having lost confidence in life, I hoped to free myself from the worries.
On September 24, 2002, when my wife was not home, I made preparation for going to heaven. I threw our clothes and grains into the courtyard.
In the morning of the following day, my third eldest sister happened to visit me. I said to her, “I am ready to go to heaven. Please ask Yuan Bingzhang to come here with the books that we often read.” Yuan Bingzhang lived in the same town as my third eldest sister. He was a pious follower of the Disciples Sect. During that period, we often got together. I thought that we should go to heaven together. Then my third eldest sister hurried to ask Yuan Bingzhang who was then busy with farming work to come to my home. I treated them with apples and peanuts. We also drank some medicinal liquor. Then we had noodle with egg for dinner.
In that evening, we watched TV for a while. Before going to bed, I asked my third eldest sister and Yuan Bingzhang, “Are you afraid of death?” They both answered, “No.” So I arranged them and my nine-year-old son to lie on the same bed with a hope that all of us may turn into smoke and ascend to heaven in the midnight. I dug a big hole in the roof as the way leading us to heaven.
At about 1:00 on the morning of September 26, I woke up my third eldest sister, Yuan Bingzhang and my son, asking them to wait on bed for ascending to heaven. Unexpectedly, my sleepy son cried out loudly, repeatedly shouting, “I don’t want to go to heaven. I want to go to school.” As a result, none of us managed to go to heaven.
But I was not willing to give up. I had made up my mind. So I asked them to come to the courtyard, and I undressed myself. Then I took off the clothes of my son (he was in the arms of my sister). I also asked my sister and Yuan Bingzhang to take off their clothes. Then I got a leather wire, tied it round our necks, and arranged all of us into a line. Taking the front position, I led the team to go around the yard and the house, keeping on murmuring. We also smashed bowls, basins, cabinets, TV set, pots and some other things in the house. I took the lead shattering the doorsill with a hammer, and then asked each of the others to give twelve strikes on it.
After an hour of rumpus, all of us were so tired that we began to breathe hard. But we had not got to the heaven as we had dreamed. I took out the wooden ladder that I had prepared, leading other people to the roof. There we performed prayer together, asking the immortals to pick us up. After the prayer, I opened an umbrella, tied all of us together with a ripe, and called to jump together with an intention to fly to the sky. Unexpectedly, we broke the roof and fell down to a heap of firewood in the kitchen.
By then, I had not yet waken up from the dream about going to heaven. I became even crazier. After we fell from the roof, I asked my sister and Yuan Bingzhang to take my son to bed, and to take good care of him to ensure that he would not flee. I hoped that I could go to heaven together with my son.
I went out of the house, and lit up a pile of firewood in the courtyard. I meant to go to heaven by burning ourselves. The dry firewood lit and began to burn fiercely.
Our neighbors were awakened by the fire. They swarmed to my home. The fire and noise sobered me up. I realized that I had made a big mistake. I was so scared that I ran naked as quickly as I could to the hill at the back of my house. There was no time for me to consider my son, my sister and Yuan Bingzhang.
On my way to flee, I picked up a suit and put it on. I concealed myself in a cave in the hill, keeping alive on spring water and uncooked sweet potatoes. A week later, I was extremely tired and hungry. I felt absent-minded all day long. I could not bear such kind of life. Moreover, I was thinking about my son. So I decided to go home.
As I approached my home, I met a neighbor who was on good terms with me. He said that he felt horribly grieved for my obsession and crazy behaviors. He told me that the other three people had survived and that the police people were looking for me. He advised me to surrender to the police, seeking for lenient treatment rather than making further mistakes.
On October 4, 2002, I gave myself to the police and was sentenced to seven years in jail for attempted crime of intentional homicide. In 2008, I was released 11 months ahead due to my good performance in the prison.
Later I learned from the police people dealing with my case that after I fled, my neighbors put out the fire and saved the people. When they tried to save the three persons, my third eldest sister Hu Suhua and Yuan Bingzhang were tightly holding my son between them while murmuring something. Since they refused to leave the house, my brother-in-law gave a slap on my sister’s face, forcing her and Yuan Bingzhang to let my son go. And other neighbors came to take my sister and Yuan Bingzhang out of the house. Thus the serious consequence had been avoided. At last, my pigsty was burned down, and two of the four rooms in my house were ruined. Two pigs were killed in the fire.
After the farce about going to heaven, I got divorced and stopped contact with my eldest and third eldest sisters. I made a clean break with the Disciples Sect. At present, I am working as a loader in a cement factory nearby. My son has grown up. He left home to make his living. We live a poor but stable life. Now I make public the farce that happened 10 years ago with a hope that other people should learn a lesson and don’t believe in any heretical cult.
The house ruined in the fire
