10 December, 2009

Nobeling in Stockholm

Its December 10th...the day Arthur Nobel died in 1896, and the day the world celebrates the fat check he promised to award outstanding achievements in the sciences, literature and peace. And to honor those achievements, they plan a giant party or two here in Scandinavia.

I say Scandinavia because Stockholm is the center of the awarding process, with a committee that selects 5 of the 6 Nobel prize winners, but Oslo also throws a big party, because their committee has the honor of selecting the Peace Prize winner.  And I think Oslo's single prize winner's celebrity this year is far surpassing anything here in Stockholm.

Regardless, the Swedes have planned quite an evening. This afternoon is the official awards ceremony, followed by a black-tie banquet with the royal family and about 1,250 other assorted big wigs. The Local (the fluffy English version of Swedish news) described a few of the preparations being made for the event. 2,692 pigeon breasts, thankyouverymuch.

Unsurprisingly, we are not partaking in many of the festivities. I could go stand in the rain by the concert house to catch a glimpse of some of the flower arrangements. But I probably won't. I am going to try to go to Swedish class tonight (I had skipped the last week or two) so I *might* learn some Swedish words to describe Nobelfesten. But I probably won't.  The university is hosting its own black-tie event, but we didn't bother to get tickets.  We will be going to a lecture by the Nobel prize winners in Economics at Stu's school on Saturday, which will likely be a snooze for me but could be interesting for him. All in all, we are pretty lame in our Nobel celebrating.  But congratulations to all of the winners, anyway!

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