【新唐人07月30日讯】 母亲年过七旬，在山东农村操劳了大半生。母亲少时读过几天书，但由于中共夺权之初农村生活的艰难，最终辍学。
在上世纪八十年代末期，我家买了电视，但母亲几乎从来不看，问她原因，笑答：只能看个（人物）出来进去，看不出个名堂。
我上大学后，我的哥哥姐姐们也都成家，母亲相对轻闲。母亲和当时还健在的父亲一起看电视，在父亲帮助下，母亲竟然也学会了看懂剧情简单的电视剧。
父亲去世后的这几年，我把母亲接到城里，母亲除了照顾我饮食、收拾家务之外，偶尔也看看电视剧。我很少看电视，母亲和我对电视剧情自然也没有什么可分享的。2007年初，我几乎花了一个多月的业余时间，买来器材，安装了ku波段卫星天线，自己调试出新唐人。调试出新唐人的一刹那，母亲虽然不知道新唐人会有什么节目，但看到一个“大锅盖”就能把天上卫星上的东西接到家里来，觉得很神奇，乐得合不拢嘴。
从那以后，除了看当地电视台的天气预报外，母亲几乎没再看过大陆电视台的节目。每天看半个小时或者一个小时的新唐人新闻（后改为环球直击）成为母亲最大的爱好，这恐怕也是母亲一生中最大、最持久的爱好。
通过新唐人，母亲知道了很多事情，并小心翼翼的（怕说错了被我笑话）在饭桌上或者闲聊中和我交流对时事的看法：比如默克尔敢说话，对中国百姓好；小布什对共产党干坏事态度不明朗，不敢说话；奥巴马上台，是不是比小布什强些；长脸的马英九看起来是个好人；小个子萨克奇一时这样、一时那样，不太稳；联合国秘书长潘基文胆子小，不帮中国百姓说话；彭克玉很不像样，操纵法拉盛一群身强力壮的坏人殴打几位老人……
对于新唐人报道的大陆新闻，虽然大都不是直接发生在自己身边，但对中国社会有深刻体验的母亲，能够感受到这些新闻的真实，感受到中国人面对不公时的艰难与无助。尤其对于中共迫害法轮功的报道，有些画面虽然连看都不敢看，但母亲从身边发生的事情，知道这些新闻报道的真实。
但就在母亲说“彭克玉很不像样”之后不几天，我出差回来，母亲焦急地告诉我：新唐人没影了。我起初以为天线故障，调了大半上午，没有结果。第二天在网上看到欧洲卫星通讯公司“技术故障”的消息。
在这之后，每天我上网时，母亲总问一句：帮我看看网上说没说新唐人什么时候好？而在这之前，我用电脑时，母亲从不轻易打扰我。
起初几天，我安慰母亲：或许很快会修好的。
但几天后等来的消息是：记者无疆界提供的录音和中共驻意大使方面的录音都表明新唐人事件背后的元凶是中共。
我想，中共干扰新唐人的丑行被揭露，文明世界正义声音的谴责会让欧卫招架不住，因此，自信地安慰母亲说：新唐人很快就会有眉目。
但在母亲的焦急等待中，昨天知道BBG将从w5撤离的消息。欧卫也正好以此为借口大模大样地与新唐人解除合同。一时间，我竟然不知道如何再面对母亲焦急的眼神，我实在不忍心让母亲再一次失望，不，这一次简直是绝望。想起这么多次对母亲的安慰，我突然感觉，我欺骗了母亲。
新唐人，一个可爱的小天使，一直用她百灵鸟般的声音告诉我们真实的中国、真实的世界，她曾经给了我们无穷的力量，去识别谎言，扫除忧虑，战胜恐惧，去笑对残酷的现实和苦难的生活，但是，这个可爱的小天使，先是被中共假借欧卫之手射伤，现在又将被代表美国政府的BBG“放弃治疗”。
新唐人，可爱的小天使，难道你真的就要永别于中国这方对你寄托了无限期望的热土？BBG，还有世界上所有正义、善良的人们，你们可知道，一对大陆母子此时孤苦无助的心情？
********
My Mother’s Anticipation
My mother is more than 70 years old, she worked hard in a farming village in Shandong province most of her life. She had been in school but very few days in her childhood. Farming villagers’ lives were very difficult in the early years of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) regime, so she had to quit school.
In the late 1980s, my family bought a television set, but my mother hardly ever watched it. When we asked her why, she said with a smile that, “I could only watch people’s coming and going, but could not understand the reason.”
When I was in college, my siblings were all married, so my mother was relatively more relaxed. She watched the television with my father. With the help of my father, she learned to understand some simple programs.
After my father passed away, I asked my mother to stay with me in the city. Other than doing the household chores for me, she watched the television occasionally. Since I rarely watch television, I cannot share with my mother any programs on television.
A Pot Cover Brings the News
Early in 2007, I spent more than a month of spare time to install a small satellite dish and was able to adjust it and find the New Tang Dynasty Television (NTDTV) myself. The moment we received the NTDTV program, my mother did not know what that was, but was amazed that a large “pot cover” was able to deliver the messages from a satellite in the sky, she grinned widely.
Since then, other than watching the local weather report, she never watches programs from Mainland television stations. Watching the NTDTV news update has become her biggest hobby. It is probably her biggest and most lasting hobby.
Peasant Learns About International Politics
Through the NTDTV, my mother has learned a lot of things. She cautiously (worrying about being laughed by me) exchanges her views at the dining table or casual chatting subjects like; Merkel (Angela Merkel, Germany’s first female chancellor) is nice to Chinese people and dares to speak up; president Bush’s approach regarding the communist regime’s evil conducts is unclear, he dares not to talk; Could Obama be a stronger president; the long faced Ma Ying-jeou (President of Republic of China, often known as Taiwan) looks like a good man; the small fellow Sarkozy is unstable, like this for a while and like that for a while; the United Nation’s General Secretary Ban Ki-moon has no guts to speak for Chinese people; Peng Keyu (Chinese Consul in New York) is not up to par, he maneuvered some Flushing strong men to beat up elderly people; ……
Although most of the NTDTV news reports did not happen directly around my mother, she is able to realize the truth of the news because of her personal encounters. She deeply feel Chinese people’s predicament when facing unfairness. In particular the news about the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong, she did not even have the nerve to watch some of the scenes. Because she had witnessed so much of what had happened around her, she knows that all that was reported by NTDTV was true.
A few days after my mother said “Peng Keyu is not up to par,” my mother anxiously told me when I came back from a business trip that she could not receive NTDTV. At first, I thought something had gone wrong with the disk, so I spent most of the morning trying to adjust it, but in vain. The next day, I learned the news on the website about Eutelsat’s “technical breakdown.”
After that, when I used the computer my mother often asked me if there is news about the time NTDTV will come back on. She never bothered me before when I used the computer.
The first few days, I comforted my mother by saying it would be fixed soon.
But the news came a few days later from the recording provided by the Reporters Without Borders and the recording of the CCP’s ambassador to Italy where both indicated that the CCP was the culprit behind the termination of NTDTV’s broadcasts.
I thought that since the CCP’s ignominy was exposed, the voice of justice from the civilized world condemning Eutelsat’s operator should make the ECS unable to resist, so I comforted my mother with confidence that NTDTV would resume broadcasting very soon.
The Comfort of Truth—Gone
But in her anxious waiting, I learned on July 29 that the long-term contract to transmit NTDTV into China had been cancelled.
The situation is that the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) signed a contract with European satellite operator Eutelsat to let Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Asia (RFA), and New Tang Dynasty Television (NTDTV) broadcast to tens of millions of small satellite dishes across China on a long-term, protected basis.
But on July 31, the eve of the Beijing Olympics, BBG cancelled its contract with Eutelsat for its broadcast on satellite W5, which is the only satellite protected by the Open Satellite Window agreement. BBG will surrender the stations’ on/off switches to Chinese authorities. Instead of being assigned to the satellite W5, U.S. international broadcasting channels will be assigned to the China-controlled satellite AsiaSat 3S.
On July 10, Reporters Without Borders released a detailed investigation showing that Eutelsat’s shutdown of NTDTV’s signal was a premeditated, politically motivated decision to satisfy Beijing’s demands and get Chinese concessions and contracts. The Wall Street Journal also revealed in 2005 that Eutelsat repeatedly tried to shut down NTDTV’s Asia broadcast under pressure from Beijing, in return for Chinese state business.
For a moment, I did not know how to face my mother’s anxious look. I did not have the heart to disappoint my mother. No, actually it would be desperation for her. As I thought of my previous comforting excuse that the NTDTV would resume soon, I suddenly felt I deceived her.
When Will the Messenger Appear Again?
The NTDTV, a lovely little angel, used its skylark kind voices to tell us the truth about China and the truth of the world. It gave us unlimited strength to recognize deceit, clear our worries, overcome fear, and to deal with the cruelty of reality and predicaments of life with a smile. But this lovely angel was hurt by the CCP using the hands of Eutelsat, and now was again “abandoning the treatment” by the BBG that represents the United States government.”
NTDTV, the lovely little angel, must you forever part this hot land of China that has infinite expectations of you?
The BBG and all just and kind people in the world, do you know the feelings of a lonely and helpless Mainland mother and child at a time like this?
