So Stephen, everyone wants to know.
What was around before the Big Bang?
Nothing was surround before the big Big
Bang.
According to Einstein's general theory of relativity, space and time together form a space-time continuum,
or manifold which has not flat but
curved by the matter and energy in it.
I adopt a Euclidian approach to quantum
gravity
to describe the beginning of the universe.
In this, ordinary real time is
replaced by imaginary time,
which behaves like a fourth direction of space.
In the Euclidean approach,
the history of the universe in imaginary time
is a four-dimensional, curved surface
like the surface of the Earth, but with two more dimensions.
Jim Hartle and I proposed a "no-boundary" condition.
The boundary condition of the universe is that it has no boundary.
In order terms, the Euclidean space time is a closed surface without end,
like the surface of the Earth.
One can regard imaginary in real time as beginning at the South Pole,
which is thesmooth point of space-time where the normal laws of physics hold.
There is nothing south of the South Pole, 
so there was nothing around before the Big Bang
