The Trouble With Lawns

Lots of work, and for what is not exactly clear:

I remember studying a tribal group in New Guinea during a college anthropology course, where the tribal members status was determined by the size of the pile of rotting yams in front of each hut (yams being their staple food). The bigger the pile of rotting yams in front of your hut the higher your status was. The people in the tribe worked very hard to pile up extra yams so they can be left to rot. I think that's a big part of the motivation at work here for creating these monster lawns.