This article originally appeared on our sister website, Urban Family Shanghai.

By Yuzhou Hu

It’s common for parents to make their kids take music lessons in China, but it’s highly uncommon to be blackmailed by a tutor. Unfortunately, this is what happened to one Shanghai father, surnamed Ling, Shine reports.

At the end of last year, Ling hired a guitar teacher from a renowned music training center in Shanghai. The teacher, surnamed Zheng, was invited to Ling’s house to tutor his son. Ling paid RMB300 (USD43) for each class.



One evening, while having dinner with Ling and his family, the guitar teacher mentioned that he owed RMB2 million (USD289,805) to loan sharks in his hometown. Worrying the tutor may do something malicious to pay off his debts, Ling fired Zheng, using the excuse that his son was too busy to continue learning guitar.



Last month, Zheng showed up at Ling’s residence. The tutor demanded a tuition fee of RMB5 million (USD724,380), threatening to harm Ling’s family if he refused to pay up. Zheng went on to say that he knew everything about the family’s daily routine and that he had hired two hitmen, reports NetEase.



Afterwards, Zheng even sent Ling a string of threatening messages via WeChat to pressure him to pay the money. “Don’t let the kid pay the price for his parents’ incorrect decision. The pain will accompany you through your whole life. This is a line I picked up from an American drama. It’s a classic,” one of the messages read.



In the end, Ling decided to call the police and Zheng was arrested shortly after. “There were no hitmen at all,” confessed the guitar tutor. “I was just bluffing. I have never seen such a luxurious house before. They must be very wealthy. That’s why I chose to extort his family.”



[Cover image via Pexels]



This article was originally published by our sister magazine Urban Family Shanghai. For more articles like this, visit the Urban Family website, or follow the Urban Family WeChat account (ID: urbanfamilyshanghai).

