Chinese Man Commits Suicide at Mall After Shopping for 5 Hours With Girlfriend

The holiday season can be stressful. Obviously. Our patience is worn thin, our wallets hit empty and all of our free time flies out the window. The persistent shopping can wear you down. The linoleum floors that pave shopping malls eat at your soul. Retail stores become synonymous with hell. Overall, unless you live to shop, it’s an unpleasant experience. It can be so unpleasant, in fact, that it drives us to make rash decisions. One man in particular couldn’t take the endless grind and decided to take matters into his own hands.

Tao Hsiao, 38, was fed up with his girlfriend’s endless shopping. After spending five hours in the Golden Eagle International Shopping Center in Xuzhou, China, he demanded that they leave immediately, when she insisted on checking out on more shoe store. In an act of defiance and pure agonizing frustration, he leaped seven floors to his death.

“He told her she already had enough shoes, more shoes that she could wear in a lifetime and it was pointless buying any more,” an eyewitness said. “She started shouting at him, accusing him of being a skinflint and of spoiler Christmas. It was a really heated argument.”

The mall’s surveillance footage shows Hsiao throw the shopping bags and jump over the railing to the cosmetics section below. He died instantly upon impact, but no other shoppers were hurt during the incident.

It’s a stressful time of year. Although the joy of the holidays should be enough to help you keep your cool, the pressure can build up and disaster can strike. So please, take a breath here and there between your digilent shopping, wrapping and planning. The holidays should be enjoyed, not feared.