In a story that sounds like it's straight from a horror film, a 95-year-old Chinese grandmother terrified her neighbours by climbing out of her own coffin six days after she was pronounced dead, only to be found calmly cooking a meal.
The Discovery That Shocked a Village
The extraordinary incident took place in Beiliu, a city in the mountainous Guangxi province of China, in February 2012. Li Xiufeng, a respected village elder, had recently suffered a bad fall and injured her head. One cold winter morning, her neighbour, 60-year-old Chen Qingwang, arrived with her breakfast as usual.
He found the elderly woman motionless in bed. "I came to wake her up," Chen later explained. "No matter how hard I pushed her and called her name, she had no reactions. I felt something was wrong, so I tried her breath, and she has gone. But her body is still not cold."
Believing she had passed away, the community began funeral preparations. Following local tradition, Li Xiufeng was placed in an open coffin in her home on February 19, two days after being found, to allow for a period of mourning. Her funeral was scheduled for six days later.
The Empty Coffin and the Kitchen Miracle
On February 24, the day before the planned ceremony, Chen Qingwang went to check on the house. To his utter horror, he discovered the coffin was empty. The body was gone.
"We were so terrified, and immediately asked the neighbours to come for help," he said. A panic spread through the community, with locals fearing a grave robbery or something more sinister. The truth, however, was far stranger.
The search party soon found the answer in the most mundane of places: the kitchen. There, they discovered Li Xiufeng sitting on a stool, quietly preparing food for herself.
"I slept for a long time," she reportedly told her stunned neighbours. "After waking up I felt so hungry and wanted to cook something to eat. I pushed the lid for a long time to climb out."
The Medical Explanation: A Freak 'Artificial Death'
Doctors were initially baffled by the 'zombie gran' case. After examination, they concluded Li Xiufeng had experienced an extremely rare phenomenon known as 'artificial death'.
This condition sees a person's breathing and vital signs become so faint they are undetectable, while the body remains warm. A doctor involved stated, "Thanks to the local tradition of parking the coffin in the house for several days, she could be saved." Had she been buried immediately, she would have suffocated.
Her miraculous return was not without tragic consequence. Another local custom required that all of a deceased person's belongings be burned so they could follow them into the afterlife. This meant that although Li Xiufeng was alive, all her earthly possessions had been destroyed, leaving her with nothing.
Not an Isolated Case
While incredibly rare, 'artificial death' has historical precedents. In 1915 in South Carolina, USA, 32-year-old Essie Dunbar was declared dead after an epileptic seizure. At her funeral, her sister asked to see the body one last time. When the coffin was opened, Essie sat up and smiled, causing ministers to faint, with one falling into the grave and breaking three ribs.
More recently, in 2014, 78-year-old Walter Williams from Mississippi was pronounced dead. His 'body' was zipped into a bag and sent to the morgue, where coroners noticed movement. He was, quite literally, alive and kicking.
The case of Li Xiufeng remains a powerful reminder of both the mysteries of the human body and how cultural practices can, in the most unexpected ways, mean the difference between life and death.
