Marie Widén, head of the Botanical Gardens, was in Ecuador when she received a text message of her colleagues: she had won one of the University’s Educational Prizes this semester.
The warmth within the greenhouses contrasts heavily with the cold outside. Marie Widén takes up a small plant in a pot and shows the bottom side:
“You see? The roots are already developing here. In May, we will put them all outside.”
Marie Widén, who has worked for the Gardens since 1989, receives this friday one of the Educational prizes, after having been nominated by the University itself.
What are your thoughts about winning this prize?
“It was a complete surprise to me. The Botanical Gardens get more than half a million visitors every year, which makes us the most-visited site in town. I am fortunate to have very nice co-workers and funding of the University to organize, for example, tours for children. Without this, there would not be a prize.”
What do you want people to take with them after a visit to the Botanical Gardens?
“I want to give them this ‘aha’-moment, when they find out how something works in nature. The joy of discovering something by yourself, that is the best way to learn! One of the prejudices about the biology is always that you have to remember so many Latin names. So I say: forget about it. You should first think about how an organism looks like and what its role in nature is. Then the Latin names will follow later more easily.”
What is so interesting about plants?
“See, Swedes travel around the world a lot to see exotic things, but you can also make great discoveries if you go to a shop with foreign spices. In an Indonesian restaurant, it might be helpful to have a biologist with you, who can tell you what plants you’re actually eating. While it is very popular to speak about ‘cute animals’, we are so familiar with plants that we forget how important they are for us.”
What makes your work here so worthwhile?
“People always go from here saying that they liked what they saw. I never heard them say that it was boring. Who else can say that? Nobody says ‘I love dentists’” she says laughing.
