Bizarre as it may seem, it actually did happen. Thousands of runners at a marathon event in China mistook soap for energy bars at the Qingyuan marathon in south China’s Guangdong province recently.

According to sources, over 12,000 runners had problems such as spasms, faintness, or stomach aches during the race, according to local health bureau officials. Twenty-three runners were hospitalized, and five of them were in critical conditions.

“The package of the soaps are indeed like food package. It is our mistake of negligence,”said one of the event hosts.

The grape scented soap was part of the gift bag for runners, which oddly enough was packaged with English words only, without any in Mandarin. Photos from the scene show many soaps were bitten at the corner and discarded on the road.

Source: People’s Daily Online