A South African man spent about 24 hours in a morgue this weekend. Not, like, hanging out! No, as a dead body.

Apparently the guy's family couldn't wake him up one morning, and assuming (incorrectly) that he was dead called a private morgue to take care of the body. The morgue, assuming the family could tell a dead body from a live one, put him on ice, and then, lo and behold:

[Eastern Cape health spokesperson Sizwe] Kupelo said the man woke up at 1700 local time (1500 GMT) on Sunday, demanding to be let out of the chilly morgue in Libode village, frightening the attendants on duty.

"At first the men ran for their lives," said Mr Kupelo.

As we all would, I think! Obviously, the attendats later returned to rectify the problem; as it turned out, the man was dehydrated and is apparently now fine. If, we assume, rather cross with his family.

Kupelo says that the country should learn a lesson:"We need to [get] the message across to all South Africans that it is very wrong for them to conclude on their own that a person has died."

[BBC; image via Shutterstock]