STUDENT FINDS RAT HEAD IN LUNCH, SCHOOL SAYS IT IS A DUCK
A scandal known as “Rat Head Gate” has been getting a lot of attention on Chinese social media after a student found what looks like a rat head in his cafeteria meal. The school, however, claims it is just a duck head.
The incident occurred last week at the cafeteria of the Jiang-xi Vocational Technical College of Industry Trade in Nanchang, China. While eating his lunch, a student found what looked like a rat’s head in the bowl of rice and pulled out his phone to record the discovery. He then confronted the cafeteria staff about it but was told that it was not a rat’s head but a duck’s head. The latter, along with duck necks, are a traditional part of Chinese cuisine, but that was not what the student had ordered, and it certainly did not look like a duck.
“This is a rat! It clearly has rat teeth! Can’t you see?” the student was heard telling the cafeteria staff.
The video quickly spread on Chinese social media, but the school doubled down on their explanation: that the head found by the student actually belonged to a duck. The Vocational Technical College put out an official statement debunking the “rat head” rumors, insisting that it was just a weird-looking duck head. The very next day, the local food supervision bureau also commented on the case, claiming that it had, indeed, been a duck head.
As the rumors kept spreading, school officials warned students not to discuss the incident online anymore, and the official catering company issued its own statement, claiming that the head had not been discovered in any food that it had delivered. The company also warned that anyone spreading rumors about it would face serious consequences.
But despite all efforts to cover up the incident, “Rat Head Gate” has been getting more and more attention online, with people from everywhere declaring their disappointment with both the school’s and the local authorities’ lies. It is a terrible thing to find a rat’s head in food, but it is the way that they all insisted it was not what it obviously was that truly shocked people.
“Discovering a rat head while eating is not [even] the scariest part,” one blogger wrote. “What is truly frightening is that the public clearly sees a ‘rat head,’ yet they all insist on claiming it to be a ‘duck neck.’ If it is really a rat head, it would be better to calmly admit it. At most, this would be a food safety incident, and one or two temporary workers might get sacked or fined, and that would be it.”
“The way that the school and the food supervision bureau have handled this matter is a complete insult to the public. It is outrageous, completely reversing right and wrong and hurting public trust just to protect one or two individuals. I wonder if these leaders are actually so stupid,” the blogger added.
Meanwhile, blogging platforms like Weibo have been flooded with photos of rat and duck skulls to show that they look nothing alike as well as with AI photos of ducks with rat heads.
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