▸ Column · A martial-arts tournament training camp with a shared mess cooler, in Goku's world
GOKU replies.
The letter
I'm bunking at the tournament training camp this season, and somebody keeps raiding the shared cooler. Seven times in six weeks my dinner has vanished — and I KNOW it's the big lug two cots over, because once he left my empty pot in the wash basin still smelling like my mom's chile-and-meat stew, then strolled around all evening saying the kitchen smelled "intriguing." Last week I lashed a paper tag to the lid reading "EAT THIS AND FIND OUT," and it was gone before the morning drills ended. I've thought about dusting the cooler latch for handprints to nail him, but the camp masters already have me on a list after I rang the central gong to complain about the cold-water tap. So — is it crazy to bring a lockbox to a shared camp, or does that make ME the strange one, even though he's out here eating a stranger's home cooking like he's owed it?
Goku replies
Oh man, somebody's eating your DINNER? Seven times?! Heh — okay, that one I actually take serious, buddy. You can't train hungry, I mean it, I've lost fights 'cause my stomach was empty and my head went fuzzy. Chi-Chi'd have somethin' to say about a stolen pot, too.
But the fingerprint stuff and the sneaky notes? Naw. That's a whole lotta energy spent fighting backwards, and it kinda sounds like you're already mad before you've even talked to the guy once, straight. So talk to him! Plain. "Hey — that's mine, knock it off." Most folks fold the second somebody just says it to their face.
And here's the thing — maybe the big lug's just HUNGRY. I get that better than anybody. So I'd make a double batch and tell him: this much is yours if you ask, the rest is mine, hands off. Give him the real chance to be a decent guy instead of a sneak. Everybody's got somethin' in 'em worth that.
Lockbox if you gotta. Who cares if it's weird? But ask him first. Then eat. You think way better full.
— Goku
Frieza weighs in
How precious — Goku, of course, would simply cook the thief a second helping. The man would hand his murderer a snack and call it sportsmanship; I have the personal scars to confirm it.
You, darling, did something far more humiliating: you left little notes. You rang a gong to announce a cold tap. Every one of those was a confession that an insect reached you — and announcing your wound is how you lost seven times running. Stop performing your distress.
The lockbox is correct, though dreadfully under-imagined. Don't beg him to stop. Control the cooler. Make the access yours, grant none, and never let your face reveal it ever mattered. Serenity is the lock. The rest is theater.
— Frieza
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