Every Morning in Korea....

My dear friend/colleague/mentor/co-worker/roommate/brother/uncle/father KabCity wrote on my facebook wall:

Every morning in Africa, a Gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a Lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest Gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you are a Lion or a Gazelle... when the sun comes up, you'd better be running.

This "African" proverb - notice how there is no specific geography that we can source this proverb too, just the exotic/erotic "Africa" - is one of my favorite passages ever, and I was touched by it ever since I encountered it in a Thomas Friendman book (Lexus and the Oliver Tree maybe).  I don't know if Kabir liked it as much as I did, but we both liked to make fun of it from time to time.

Given the recent events of Korea, I wrote him back the following:

Everyvmorning in Korea, a South Korean leader wakes up. He knows he must make bigger bombs than the North Koreans, or he will be killed. Every morning a North Korean leader wakes up. He knows he must make bigger bombs than the South Koreans AND the Americans AND the Japanese, or he will be bombed to death.  It doesn't matter whether you are a South Korean or a North Korean... when the sun comes up, you'd better be making bombs.

In Swahili, the word bomba means water pipe.  We should make more bombas, not bombs.