A Fatness Contest
An indigenous group in Africa holds a contest among its members to see which of them can grow the fattest in a three month period.

The usually slender contestants forego all other activities during the competition, concentrating all their energies on drinking milk, eating cream and getting fat.

Last year's winner claimed the prize - and promptly fell over dead!

A Status Thing
In some cultures physical plumpness equals wealth, abundance, plenty, success. It's a status thing.

Our culture has its own version of the fatness contest. And ours also produces casualties. In a society which competes to produce, succeed and accumulate, our outer world may grow prosperous and sleek, while our inner world becomes thin, bewildered and frail.