A corpse was found by revellers at the famous Dameisha beach in Shenzhen’s Yantian District on Sunday (Aug 11). The corpse was fully clothed so it is unlikely he simply drowned while swimming. Police are trying to find out who he is and where he came from, Caijing Life reports.

At around 2 p.m., a Mr Pan saw a crowd gathering close to the water and he went over to see what the fuss was about. He saw the corpse floating face down and took the below photograph. He later told media that it had already started to decay, which suggests it had been swept in from elsewhere.

The corpse, image courtesy of Caijing Life

Many beach goers spoke to media about their horror at what they saw, but the beach doesn’t seem to have been any less busy than usual for the rest of the day.

However, if this June article in Britain’s Daily Mail is anything to go by, beach goers at Dameisha are still not as nonchalant or callous as some of their counterparts in Italy. Here the article describes one of several supposed incidents from recent years in which beach goers ignored a corpse and continued to have a good time:

The alert was raised when two women noticed the woman’s collapsed body in the shallow water on Monday, Italian news agency ANSA said.
But after the initial shock the cheerful beachgoers paid no attention to the tragic scene, apparently unmoved by the grisly sight at Formia, half way between Rome and Naples.

But The Nanfang should hasten to add that The Daily Mail is synonymous with sensation and xenophobia.