Reports out of Pasadena last week claim that historic Rose Bowl Stadium is not in fact a crap-ton of well-arranged roses.
“I mean, I believe that the parade floats are all flowers,” said a Rose Bowl Game attendee who spoke under the condition of anonymity. “But as soon as we had to walk through these bouquets that looked exactly like rusted chain-link fences to get to our cracked concrete-looking seats, I got skeptical of the whole ‘rose bowl’ thing.
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Other fixtures of the stadium grounds are also made of non-floral materials, witnesses say. On gameday, Alex Jameson ’15 unwittingly found herself in a scuffle with a 29-year-old man holding a “Christ shall smite the BCS” placard outside stadium gates. “I thought the guy was an amazingly realistic floral accoutrement to the whole Rose Bowl environment, so I went up to sniff it,” Jameson told the Flipside. “Turns out that a rose by the name of ‘homeless zealot’ smells like seagull shit.
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Although pleased with their team’s first Rose Bowl victory since the Nixon Administration, many Stanford fans who attended the game felt disillusioned by what they are calling false marketing by the Tournament of Roses.
“When I heard there was going to be a flyover before the game, I was shocked and excited about seeing a giant flower airplane somehow soar over the stadium,” reported Tom McGibbons ’16.
“When I saw that it was really just a billion-dollar, silent-flying warfare machine, the day lost a lot of is luster.”
Stadium and City of Pasadena officials could not be reached for comment on the composition of the venue. An aide for Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott, when asked to respond to the allegations, uttered “moron” and hung up.
