Back in the 1980s, when my company Zortech was located in London, my partner set up a "Meet Walter Bright" with the tech press there. After all, my picture was on the Zortech ads and the compiler manual.
When I arrived at the meet & greet, the journalists thought I was a model (!) hired to be a figurehead. I had to show them my passport to convince them that was my real name, and answer a bunch of tech questions to show I knew all about C++ and compilers.
It was a very amusing experience for me, especially that some people thought I was handsome enough to be a model, LOL.