Introducing the ALA YouTube Channel

We've just launched the ALA YouTube channel, starting with this video taken on the first day of school. You can follow the channel here.

Late Night E-mail and Pizza

Late night e-mail checking and pizza eating in the lab. Two things South Africa does right: amazing avocados, and an incredible pepper-like thing called a peppadew - a little sweet plus a little spicy equals perfect. Tony's Thai chicken pizza brings the two together in edible bliss.

Camping with folks from GodFirst

Last weekend, I went camping with folks from my church, GodFirst. It was really good to get away and see that there are beautiful places near Joburg, and to get to know all these people a bit better. And there was a killer water slide!

Hailstorm

Summer comes to Johannesburg, and with it thunderstorms. Last week, we had a brilliant (I'm starting to talk like a South African) storm that not only dumped rain, but spit out large chunks of hail. In the end, the quad was covered with a beautiful frosting of white balls of ice, which soon became mixed in the laughter a dozen students who used them for the next best thing to a snowball fight.

Jacaranda

The jacaranda trees turn a beautiful purple and rain down their purple petals on the ALA campus.

Cheek cells

We are studying cell biology now, and I had the students all look at their own cheek cells under the light microscope. I managed to get a picture of one student's cheek cells by sticking my digital camera up to the eyepiece. You can see the nucleus stained blue and even tiny blue mitochondria! Very cool!