After a meal at a late night eatery, one man lost out on paying the bill and lost some face. In response, he made his friend lose consciousness.
The incident occurred at around 5 a.m. on October 25th at a restaurant in Guangzhou’s Yuexiu District. After meeting up at a bar, a group of friends decided to go have a bite to eat together. However, when the check came, things got testy with two buddies competing to be the one to pick up the check.
In China, it’s a time-honored tradition to battle over who gets to pay at the end of a meal. Paying means gaining all-important “face” or esteem in front of your friends or colleagues.
In the end, a 25-year-old man surnamed Zhong came out as the victor. Angry at having “lost face” in front of the group, the loser, a 22-year-old man surnamed Ou attacked his friend once they got outside, knocking him out cold on the sidewalk, the Nanfang Daily reports.
By the following evening, Zhong was still in the hospital and Ou had been arrested by police. It’s not clear how much the restaurant bill was for.
Of course, it still could have been worse. In May 2014, one Beijing man got into a scuffle over a bill at a hot pot restaurant. During the fight, his friend accidentally knocked over a bowl filled with boiling water onto him, causing severe burns all over his body and leading to his death one month later.