A Chinese woman is asking 40,000 yuan ($5,500) from a work colleague and accusing them of slapping her on the back using a kung fu technique that left her unable to work for 12 months.

The woman, surnamed Zheng, recently told a television network in her native city of Hangzhou, China’s Zhejiang province, that she was working as a security guard at a metro station in the city last summer when a colleague ruined her life with a simple slap on the back. She was allegedly napping with her head on a desk during an afternoon break when a male colleague named Lu slapped her on the back to wake her up. Zheng recalls that she felt a sensation she could only compare to an electric shock before feeling her arms and neck go numb. She claims that a photo taken by another coworker clearly showed the mark of five fingers on her back. One thing is for sure, though, Zheng could not work for a year after the incident and now she feels like Lu owes her financial compensation.

Photo: Sasun Bughdaryan/Unsplash

When Zheng started complaining after the slap on the back, Lu allegedly gave her 3,000 yuan ($400) under the condition that she wouldn’t take any legal action against him. The woman agreed, but when her condition did not improve after a month, she went to hospital where doctors told her that she had a protruding spinal disk and advised her to rest for a couple of weeks. She ended up missing work for a whole year.

Over time, Zheng became convinced that her coworker used a kung fu technique known as “iron sand palm” or simply “iron palm” when he slapped her back, as he always boasted about studying martial arts. Taught in many martial arts schools across China, this technique is apparently used to condition practitioners to deliver powerful strikes by punching a canvas bag filled with iron sand.

 

Earlier this year, Zheng confronted Lu and told him she wanted 40,000 yuan (US$5,500) as compensation for all her medical bills and lost income from being unable to work, but he refused and broke all contact with her. Left with no other choice, Zheng decided to take her story to the media. Unfortunately, the general reaction to her plight wasn’t as empathic as she expected. Most people just made fun of her frailty.

“Are you made of tofu? Your body falls to pieces from a slap?” one person asked on Weibo.