Esther
Would you buy a pair of legs at US$60,000?
Last Tuesday morning hours, a man was found in Tianhe Region of Guangzhou selling his legs. While seated in the center of an overhead bridge, the man wore on his legs a cardboard indication that read: “Legs for Sale! $30,000 each!”
The legs sale triggered quite a fuss and drawn a large crowd. According to one of the witnesses, the man even had a butchers knife and sign saying “Cut & Sale on the spot!” before that.
Before you start giving your sympathy and think that this man is selling his legs for survival, no… he’s not doing it for real.
50-year-old Cheng Shaoqing is actually “selling” his legs in protest to the compensation claim rejections for the leg injuries he had suffered from his workplace. Cheng is an employee in a local Guangzhou bank and since May 2005, he often had to transport metal cabinets filled with data files at work.
The heavy load had caused burden on his knees, resulting in frequent sprains and injuries to his knees. Cheng even underwent operations for his knees three times, in August 2007, November 2008 and March 2009.
The main intention of Cheng’s legs sale is to bring his case to the attention of the Social Security Office and his company. After spending over US$30,000 on medical fees and borrowing from all his friends and relatives, Cheng finds no one who is willing to loan any more for his future treatments. Feeling hopeless, he decided to seek help by “selling” his legs on the streets.
With the pictures of Cheng “selling” his legs floating on the internet and Chinese news sites, it seems that Cheng’s legs sale has successfully caught the interests of the media and the public, although relevant authorities have yet to speak up. We wonder, though, what Cheng would do if someone really went up and offered US$60,000.
CHENG, stop it…before you get locked up for false advertisement XD