Nobel 2014 3: An Unexpected Journey
So if anyone from my work is reading this, I’m going to make an admission. The day that Weo won I went to work, but other than making sure I was responding to email I did nothing else work-related. Instead, I spent the whole day doing what I imagine a lot of family members of winners do – I monitored the internet for news to see if any new details had emerged – i.e. had anyone finally found and interviewed Weo? And I started doing research about how to be a tourist in Stockholm.Thank you, Internet!
I knew that at least Eileen and I would want to make the trip to attend the awards ceremony. How could we NOT be there? Whatever it took, we were going to go. With luck we’d be able to take the boys also. That last bit hinged on a critical question: just how the hell do you get admitted to the Nobel Prize Awards Ceremony, and will it be open to kids? There must be tickets – but how do you get them? And what about the Nobel Prize Banquet that follows the awards – is that something we could consider, or was that a “closed” event? No amount of searching for information led to anything definitive, however.
Curse you, Internet!
At this point, I’m not thinking at all about how this is likely to really work. Not surprisingly, there are provisions for the Laureates to invite a limited number of guests to join them (more on that in future postings). Right now, however, I’m just focused on figuring out the logistics of making our own arrangements to get to Stockholm. I feel confident I can get us to Stockholm, find us a hotel, and plan places to tour while we kill time waiting for the awards ceremony – but how to get into the awards ceremony is still a great mystery.
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We finally come to the end of Day 1 of Hearing That Weo Has Won The Nobel Prize. It is the late evening and Sharon and I finally have the phone call that we couldn’t have at 6AM that day due to the presence of TV cameras. We put the call on speakerphone so we can all hear on our side. Sharon fills us in on all the details that she can – but curiously enough at this time there STILL hasn’t been any official notification from the Nobel Committee on the award. (I don’t know how long it took for Weo to be “officially” notified – it may have actually happened that first day, but not that Sharon knew at the time.)
A bit tentatively I tell her that we’d like to be in Stockholm to witness the awards and I’d been researching tourist stuff all day. Sharon tells me that she imagines we can be “part of their entourage” and that we MIGHT be able to get some logistical assistance from the Nobel folks. (I want to be Sweat Wiper and Gum Injector.) So we now get our first inking that, if we sit tight, a lot of our confusion may be cleared up and perhaps our planning process might become vastly simplified. Since there’s been nothing official yet, just what can be truly expected is unknown.
Except…
Sharon tells us of a book that a colleague has told her about, called “Reindeer with King Gustaf: What to Expect When Your Spouse Wins the Nobel Prize”, which was written in 2009 by the wife of another Stanford professor who won a Nobel in 1998. (UC Berkeley likes to brag that they provide private parking slots to all their Nobel Winners. Stanford counters that they don’t have nearly enough spaces to accommodate all of their winners. This is what passes for trash talking in academia. For the record, Cal currently has 8 living Laureates while Stanford has 22.) Obviously this book is going to be of tremendous interest to Sharon – but a Kindle copy is only $8 so we grab one and both read it the next day.
Stunning. Amazing. Unbelievable. Pick any of them. They all apply. What this woman describes in incredible. The experiences of the Laureate (and his wife) are almost beyond belief. Some of those experiences will be discussed in later postings. For now, what we learn is that both the awards ceremony and the banquet are probably firmly in our future, as well as something we can take the boys to.
With that, an exhausting, adrenaline-soaked day comes to an end…and we haven’t actually done anything like, you know, win a Nobel Prize. Basking in the glow of someone else’s success can be tiring.
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The really interesting stuff is starting!
It is now Monday October 13, 2014, five days after the announcement. Sharon forwards on an email sent to Weo from the Nobel Committee. It appears that someone has finally reached out and spoken to him directly and let them know that he’s their personal contact person for planning until they arrive in Stockholm.
So this apparently isn’t the greatest prank in living memory.
The email recaps details that have been discussed, the highlights of which are:
• Heads up that the Nobel Foundation’s travel partner will soon contact them to arrange for flights for S&W, plus be available to guests if desired.
• S&W need to be in Stockholm no later than December 5. “Nobel Week” runs Dec 6-12. Starting Dec 13 they can expect to receive invitations from around Sweden. They are advised to forward all invitations back to him and he’ll track things. Most importantly, he advises them NOT to accept any invites until there’s a full picture of things.
• They can invite up to 14 guests – so they’re allowed a total party of up to 16, including themselves. (They can actually invite more folks, but only members of the “official” entourage are eligible for invitations to things like the Award Ceremony or Banquet.)
• The Foundation will put them up at the Grand Hotel Stockholm, and guests can optionally make their own reservations there at specially negotiated rates.
• The Foundation will assist all male guests in rental of formal attire. (The awards and banquet are white tie and tails for the men, formal gowns for the women.)
• They will be assigned a personal assistant (“Nobel Attendant”) while in Stockholm. From the “Reindeer” book previously mentioned, we know that this is exactly what it says – one person who knows how the process works will essentially be with them all the time to keep them on schedule and grease any squeaky wheels for them.
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Tuesday October 14 – more details emerge of what we can expect for Nobel Week.
Sharon forwards a summary schedule that includes the known events, who is expected/allowed to attend, and guidelines on dress. Below, the code LSFG is used to indicate “Laureate”, “Spouse”, “Family”, “Guests”. And, yes, I’m going geeky by using military time.
Sat 12/6
0940-1145 Laureate Get Together @ Nobel Musuem (L/suit, S/casual,”close family”/casual)
1600-1700 Laureate Inteview (L/suit)
Sun 12/7
0900-? Nobel Press Conference (L/suit)
?-? Rehearsal for Monday’s Lecture (L/unknown)
1900-? Academy Dinner (L/suit,S/dress)
Mon 12/8
0900-? Weo’s Nobel Lecture (All, L/suit, others casual). This is a public event, I think.
1845-? Nobel Concert @ Stockholm Concert Hall (L/suit,S/dress,up to 8 guests/same)
Tue 12/9
0930-1700 Nobel Week Dialogue @ Stockholm City Conf Center – open to the public
1800-2000 Laureate Reception @ Nordic Museum (LSFG/suits and dresses)
Wed 12/10
1030-? Awards Rehearsal @ Concert Hall (LS/casual)
1615-1745 Awards Ceremony @ Concert Hall (LSFG/formal – tails and gowns)
1840-2100? Awards Banquet @ City Hall (LSFG/formal – tails and gowns)
Thu 12/11
? Award-related Paperwork with Nobel Foundation (LS/casual)
1300-1600 Taping of TV program “Nobel Minds” (LS+4 guests/suits and dresses)
1910-? Royal Banquet (LS/formal – tails and gowns)
Fri 12/12
Nothing scheduled
Sat 12/13
1815-? Lucia Ball (LSFG) – not sure what this is yet.
Although not yet confirmed, based upon the Reindeer book we believe that “Family” = Daniel, while “Guests” = us, even though we’re family. As it happens, that distinction doesn’t seem important right now, but it may later. There’s some events and places that simply can’t handle all the folks there to support all the Laureates. Plus I’m guessing that the Laureates greatly appreciate that some things are uniquely for them and their spouses – this party is for them, of course. We’re thrilled that we’ll be allowed to share pieces of it – but we’re not here to film an episode of “Nobel Week Crashers”. (Note to self: float this idea to The Discovery Channel. It’s gold.)
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Weo has previously attended the Nobel Awards and Awards Banquet as a guest. He was there in 2001 for the Nobel Centennial celebration. Apparently, he managed to refrain from any horrific faux pas, which is good because you don’t want the King to remember that you dropped trou’ the last time you were in the country when he hands over the award.
When it comes to the Awards Banquet, however, there is one thing that we’ve read in the Reindeer book that has me a bit nervous.
Apparently, the King and Queen have nothing better to do that night so they attend the banquet, too. I’m guessing that when the King hands over the award earlier in the day to each Laureate the conversation goes something like this:
King: Congratulations, dude. You must be hella smart. Here’s a piece of paper and a big piece of chocolate covered in gold foil.
Laureate: Thank you, your Majesty.
King: Hey, bro, do you know if anyone is going out later? Me and the old lady were hoping we could tag along.
Laureate: Um…well a couple of us were going to grab dinner….but – you know - we were hoping to keep it small….um….I’m not sure we could expand the reservations…and you’d be bored, anyway. I’m sure you’d have more fun flogging some peasants…
King: Hey, no problemo – we won’t take up much space. And it would be way cool to catch up. Hey, did I ever tell you about the time in high school when I scored the winning goal against Uppsala Tech? Those were TOTALLY AWESOME days, dude!
So, anyway, the King will be there. And apparently the King is a cyborg without internal plumbing, because as long as the King is in the room no one can leave. And by “no one can leave” I mean that no one can get up to go. You know, “Go”. Undrink the morning juice. Return your beer rental. See a man about a dog. Write your name on the wall (men only). Get the picture?
I have two young boys. They’ll be fine. I’m worried about me and my rapidly ageing prostate.
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And now, let’s talk clothing.
I still have several suits in the closet that I haven’t worn in years. I like wearing suits – I think they look great. But Californians collectively decided about 15 years ago that suits were no longer appropriate. You can’t show off your nipple rings and tats in a suit, apparently. So my suits have hung in the closest for years.
And guess what? When you leave a man’s suits in the closet for that long THEY GET SMALLER. That’s clearly the ONLY reason why all the waistbands can’t be fastened and the jackets don’t button. (When I think of all the grief teenage me gave to my then-in-his-fifties father about his pot belly…well, really, really sorry Dad!)
Thankfully, for us guys the solution is soooooo easy. We found Andrew a nice black suit jacket at Kohl’s which we’ll marry to some pants we already have. We then ran over to Men’s Warehouse where Robert and I both get outfitted with new suits, shirts, and ties. Easy peasy – we’re in/out in about 45 minutes, and are now ready for any event where “suit” is called for. We’re expecting that we’ll have to send a bunch of measurements to the Nobel Foundation for our tails and those will auto-magically show up in our hotel room in Stockholm when we need them.
Eileen and I know that, with Robert still growing, he’ll likely only wear his suit once before it won’t fit again. However, we’ll hand it down to Andrew. We decide we’re going to have to ask Weo to win another Nobel in five years so Andrew can wear it.
Speaking of Eileen, she of course requires new dresses and – gulp! – a formal gown. My brother-in-law Jeff has already volunteered Lise to go shopping with Sharon who, of course, is facing the same challenges (only more so, since she is the wife of a Laureate and – who knows – might have to distract the King by showing cleavage while Weo pockets a Royal Ashtray or other souvenir). Like our late sister Debra, Lisa is quite comfortable in this more elegant world so will no doubt give Sharon great reassurance.
Eileen is currently on her own for her clothing. I can’t believe she didn’t think my idea was appropriate. What’s wrong with a blouse made of recycled plastic six-pack rings and a skirt of swan feathers? I’m embellishing. I didn’t suggest the blouse. Sadly, I really DID make a joke about the swan feather skirt.
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Another homework assignment forwarded in email by Sharon.
We have to fill out quick info with our full names (as found on our passports), our relationship to the Laureate, names of our immediate family among the other guests and how we’re related, our gender, age (just for those under 21), title, profession, email, languages spoken (Yeah, right. As if.), and finally any food restrictions.
Although not stated, we assume that they want this data to figure out the seating chart at the Awards Banquet. Or they are just REALLY nosey.
From the Reindeer book we know that every diner has his/her own footman standing behind him/her, waiting to place food in front of you, fill your water glass (note to self: Careful. Remember, no trips to the bathroom while the King is in the room), pickup your napkin, and generally ensure you don’t make an ass of yourself. (Actually, only the King has a dedicated attendant. The rest of us have to make due with waiters at our table.)
They are also very careful to ensure that they don’t poison you with food and drink you can’t have. I read somewhere a story of the teetotaler Laureate Richard Feynman. At his 1965 dinner the waitress carried out two identical bottles to serve him and the King. The King’s bottle had wine, while his bottle had water.
Any hopes I may have harbored to poison Eileen at the Banquet by slipping nuts into her food – she has a nut allergy – come crashing down. The authorities won’t believe that the kitchen screwed it up – they have this down to such a science that slip ups like this apparently just do not happen.
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A digression. Here’s what the office of a Nobel Prize winner looks like:
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| If your kid has a really messy room then you might have a future Nobel Prize winner on your hands. |
My uncle captioned this photo: “Cleanliness and Godliness” has nothing to do with “successiness”.
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A little more about the Nobel Banquet. This is apparently The Social Event of the Year in Sweden. Invitations are prized. Thankfully, the Laureates’ guests are given priority before the tickets are thrown open to the general public. So we’ll be there, along with about 1,200 of our closest friends. Apparently those who can’t attend can watch it live at home in Sweden. I’m sure it’s riveting. (“Honey, come watch as people we don’t know eat food.”) Later we’ll discover that both the award ceremony and dinner were live-streamed on the internet, and several family members in the US actually watched.
As the premier event, the food is front and center. Menus from prior years are all posted on the Nobel web site, so you can look for yourself if interested. Earlier in the year there had been a competition among Michelin-level chefs with the winner getting the right to create and execute the menu for that year’s banquet. For months the 45+ chefs have been testing and rehearsing, the 250+ servers have been going over their assignments, and the sommeliers have been preparing the 400 bottles of champagne and 400 bottles of red wine that will be served. According to both Weo (who attended in 2001) and the author of the Reindeer book, 1,200 people will be served HOT Michelin Star-quality food at the same time. Forget the Laureates – whoever figured out how to do THAT should be getting the Nobel.
And here’s also a hint that the preliminary schedule Sharon shared with us is just a tiny subset of what Nobel Week entails. Following the Banquet (at least according to the Reindeer book) is something called the “Nobel Nightcap”, hosted each year by a different university. This is where Laureates and guests can party with students until the wee hours. I bet that the Literature Laureate probably spends most of his time trying to pick up chicks. (“Hey, babe. Want to come upstairs and read my writings about ennui?”)
And now a serious moment. The demands made on the Laureates and their spouses can potentially be crushing. Yes, in so many ways Nobel Week is a non-stop celebration for them. But it really IS non-stop. They have to be CONSTANTLY “on”. The days are apparently very long, and many of the traditions are 100+ years old. Of those things that are open for guests to attend, we can make a choice. Daniel can make a choice. The other guests can make choices. But the strictures of convention and tradition basically leave Sharon and Weo no choices. They have to attend EVERYTHING. They have to drink with King AND student. They have to dance in ballroom AND university basement.
Hopefully, they’ll revel in it and not want to miss out on any aspect of the experience…because they’re going to experience it whether they want to or not.
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Another digression. I am amazed at how often this happens:
Me: My brother-in-law was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry.No, he did NOT win the Nobel Peace Prize for Chemistry (which does NOT exist), and he certainly did NOT win the Nobel Peace Prize (which IS a real award and went to Malala Yousafzai in 2014).
Rube: Hey, Martha! This guy’s brother-in-law just got the Nobel Peace Prize!
(Or, alternately: “…just got a Nobel Peace Prize for Chemistry!”)
There are a total of 6 Nobel awards given out annually.
Five of them originated in Sweden and are awarded by Nobel Committees that are housed in Sweden. These five are the Nobel Prizes in Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, and Economics. Each one is called “The Nobel Prize for <blah>”.
The sixth award is the Nobel Peace Prize, which originated in Norway and whose Committee is housed in Oslo. No doubt the Norwegians looked at the economic bonanza generated by the 150 or so guests invited by the winners to Sweden and thought “We need to get in on that action. Just imagine how many Twizzlers we can sell to a winner’s friends if we give out a prize, too”.
The Swedish-honorees all gather in Sweden to get their awards. The Peace Prize winner goes to Norway for a completely unrelated award ceremony. The Swedish winners and the Peace Prize winner eventually do meet in Stockholm at the end of the week in Sweden, at which point the Swedish winners challenge the Peace Prize Winner(s) to a game of "Are YOU Smarter Than a 5th Grader, Because WE Are?"
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| Some of the Swedish Nobel Winners meet the Nobel Prize winner. They are all trying to make contact with a portkey in order to be transported to the Quidditch World Cup. The typical Nobel Prize winner won't get this joke. |
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Back to our logistics. One week after the announcement of Weo’s win, equipped with contact information for the Grand Hotel Stockholm, we book two (connecting) rooms for December. Our plans are:
Sat Dec 6: Depart SFO
Sun Dec 7: Arrive Stockholm
Fri Dec 12: Depart Stockholm/Arrive SFO
At the time I book the rooms we don’t yet have flight reservations. Although I’ve scoped out the flights using kayak.com I’m waiting to first hear from Scanworld, the travel partner that the Nobel Committee uses to arrange flights for the winners and allows guests to optionally use. We assume that they don’t even have our contact info yet, so no shock that we haven’t heard from them.
And now an admission. I decided to write this blog one week after Weo was announced as a winner. One concern I had is that I wasn’t sure I could sustain the narrative long enough to justify setting up a blog. [Note from 2019: I never did actually create a blog.] So everything you have read up until this moment was actually pre-written by me on October 15 and 16. Seeing that this is the 29th entry has given me the confidence that I had enough material to continue.
So I’m actually writing this particular entry on October 16, and I confirmed the hotel reservations just a couple of hours ago. When I wrote the first paragraph above I also had my first “Uh oh” moment. I just realize I’ve committed us to checking into the hotel on December 7 without actually knowing that we’ll be able to get a flight that matches our intentions. I know it will all work out, but I’m having a nervous moment right now. (I have already decided that if I don’t hear from Scanworld by early next week I’m just going to go ahead and book our flights on my own. I suspect that they aren’t going to offer rates any different than those I can get myself. I want to give them a chance to prove me wrong, but I’m not going to wait forever.)
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In the first week following the announcement, once we had determined that we were going to go to Stockholm, we had to consider how to handle school for the boys.
Andrew had told his 4th grade teacher the day after the announcement that his uncle had won the Nobel Prize. Her first response: “What? Are you serious?” Once she realized that he was quite serious she asked him to share the news with the whole class. Later, when Eileen mentioned to her our intent to pull Andrew out for Nobel Week she was so excited for Andrew. Perfect!
Robert was a bit different. He didn’t initially tell anyone at school. “There was never a point in conversation when it seemed natural to say something”, he would tell us. Of course, as a freshman in high school we had more concerns about how his teachers might react to our intentions to pull him out of school for a week. So off went an email.
Most of his teachers responded within 24 hours, and all with same basic message. The week we’re gone is review week for finals, so there’d be almost no new content to be missed. Further, they all commented that he was a great student so they didn’t think his absence would be a problem for him. Phew! We were worried that at least one of them might take a hard-line position and refuse to condone his absence to the point of refusing to allow him to take work with him or make it up.
We also dodged a big bullet. If Nobel Week and Finals Week had coincided we might have had to leave Robert home. That would have been hugely disappointing to all of us. Again – phew!
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Hard to believe, but there are some days when nothing happens even remotely related to the Nobels.
Instead, celebrating the fact that the SF Giants beat the St. Louis Cardinals last night and are advancing to the World Series for the 3 time in 5 years.
Yeah, so life is good.
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Another example of how life is different for Nobel Prize winners:
Sharon and Weo are having to make plans to be in Washington D.C. for a reception being given by the Swedish Ambassador to the United States at the Swedish Embassy. There are 4 American winners this year (Weo, co-winner Eric Betzig, Medicine co-winner John O'Keefe, and Physics co-winner Shuji Nakamura). Oh, and while they are in Washington they'll drop by and spend some time with Obama at the White House. You know, just because they will be in the neighborhood.
Of course, some things remain remarkably the same. At the same time all this planning is going on Sharon and I are also exchanging emails about Thanksgiving at our house. We're trying to nail down who is making the cheesecake this year.
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NOTE FROM 2019: It is here that my pre-event notes that had been intended to be serialized in blog format ended. I had a second set of notes, written while we were in Stockholm, which formed the bulk of emails I sent home to family during the main events in Stockholm. I’ve used those and also fleshed out those notes with our non-Nobel tourist experiences. Since I hadn’t written down those memories at the time I’ve forgotten some of the details. Cie la vie!
What happens next? Tune into the next episode by selecting another page from the "2014 Nobel" menu, above. These instructions cheerfully supplied as a public service for those who haven't won a Nobel Prize.
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