The Hydro-phony Garden

In spring of 2018, Marist Dining Services unveiled a hydroponic seedling garden in the main dining hall. The vertical farm station has been a fixture in the dining hall for about a year now, with its bright UV light and sci-fi appearance leaving many students to wonder its purpose.

The objective of this unique, agricultural device is to grow and nurture seedlings so they can be transplanted to the main garden, giving plants an opportunity to jumpstart their growth.

The garden is a beneficial addition to the dining experience and symbolizes Marist’s commitment to environmentalism.

But it’s all a sham.

The plants in the dining hall do not grow; they are switched out like a class fish when one swims up the river. Last weekend I was in Home Depot, trying to decide on a new light fixture for the master bathroom (I’m going for a rustic look, I went with the bronze), and while I was strolling down the saw-dusted aisles I finally figured out how Sodexo got away with “growing plants.” In Home Depot, there are houseplants in the front of the store, the type of plants you would find in a dentist’s lobby, a lonely professor’s office, or a hydroponic garden.

This is my theory. Every two weeks, instead of working the Rossi’s station at the North End Dining Hall, a Sodexo employee treks over to Home Depot and purchases a series of slightly more mature sprouts to replace the stagnant ones in the dining hall.

Have you ever actually noticed the plants? For all we know, they could’ve been planted as tomato plants, sprouted as basil and are now mini pumpkin vines: we would not know! This horticultural scam is a mere stunt pulled by Sodexo to promote an eco-friendly façade. This is a front to distract students from the high pollutant preparation of food in the back.

Every appliance in the dining hall kitchen is powered by an individual generator, which runs on crude oil. The runoff of these machines goes straight into the Hudson where nobody will ever see them. If you have ever jumped into the river, you may be familiar with the cigarette-flavored water. That all comes from the Main Dining Hall. But nobody ever thinks to trace it back to Sodexo… because we are too busy looking at the UV lights of a fake garden. Like flies attracted to a porch light.

There are some accounts that the dining hall only runs the UV lights of the garden at night, to “conserve energy.” Bull****. They do not always run the UV lights because nothing is growing behind those glass panels.

Sodexo, if you want to put your energies towards something useful- buy a Hydroponic Rossi’s Vodka Chicken-Parm Garden, that way students do not have to wait the length of a class period to taste proof there is a God.

This article is 100 percent fictitious and not to be taken seriously in any way. Sodexo, please do not withhold my meal swipes for this writing!