WORLD CUP / USA 1994 : WORLD CUP JOURNAL : Soccer Fans Wear Their Hearts on Their Sleeves
At Dodsworth’s Bar and Grill on Colorado Boulevard in Old Pasadena, Armando Reza, 36, a lab technician from Guadalajara, Mexico, was resplendent in a green Mexican soccer federation shirt, black shorts and a Mexican flag sticking up from the back of his head.
On the next stool sat Laszlo Vandor, 30, a Hungarian-born hairdresser with a blue-and-yellow Swedish flag painted on his face, a cowboy hat on his head and a six-foot Swedish flag draped around his shoulders.
At any sign of Mexican progress in its televised match against Norway, Reza would toot out a 1-2-3 signal on a whistle, and his countrymen would cheer: “Mex-i-co!”
“I don’t know if I’m the biggest Mexico fan, but I’m a true Mexico fan,” he said.
Whenever the Norwegians made a move, Vandor let loose with a cowbell.
“Now I’m cheering for Norway, and in the next match, I’m cheering for Sweden, because I’m a European,” said Vandor, who has lived in the United States for 10 years but is about to move to Sweden to marry a Swedish girl.
After Norway’s goal, Reza uttered a mild oath and said, “Oh well, that’s soccer.” Then he leaned over to shake Vandor’s hand. He had to wait. Vandor was busy ringing his cowbell.
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On the sidewalks outside, souvenir salesmen hawked caps and T-shirts. John Martin, 35, of Santa Cruz, said he had unloaded 250 of his barely legal “World Soccer U.S.A. 1994” T-shirts for $5 each.
They show a large soccer ball, and the flags of World Cup winners and host countries from previous years, all without using the words “World Cup” in an effort to avoid trademark infringement problems.
“If I can’t sell 200 shirts to 100,000 people, I’m in the wrong business,” he said.
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In CT’s Old Town Sports Bar, owner Mike Fata, 35, had to thread his way through hundreds of fans crowded around his TV sets. “I’ve got 18 or 20, I think,” he said. One set was tuned to a golf match, but the cigarette-smoking, beer-swilling crowd ignored it to cheer and moan for every kick and bounce.
With Mexico barely holding on, the kitchen staff, made up largely of Mexican immigrants, “don’t have time to look up and see what’s going on,” he said.
“Most of the rest of us are Ugly Americans who don’t know soccer from whatever, but if things keep up like this, I might get interested in it.”
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Three workmen, Antonio Palacios, 25, Jose Gutierrez, 22, and Hugo Miranda, 20, were also waiting outside the stadium. They had installed some balloons before the game, and had to wait around to take them down after it was over.
“Our job is done, so we just sit here for seven hours,” Gutierrez said. “Right now all we’re doing is telling people to stay out of the bushes and use the public toilets instead.”
Contributing to World Cup coverage were Times staff writers Mathis Chazanov, Laura A. Galloway, Eric Malnic, Robert Lopez, Nicholas Riccardi, Ted Johnson and Nora Zamichow.
