Yesterday at about noon, there was an interesting phenomenon here- the sun had a rainbow ring all the way around it. I've never seen anything like it, but it scared some of the students. There are tons of superstitions here, and they come up all the time in biology. One of the biggest beliefs is that any unusual solar or lunar activities- eclipses, etc., cause birth defects. This belief is firmly held, and no matter what I tell my students, they all agree that pregnant woman should never go out in an eclipse. I'm covering pregnancy now with my girls, and growth and development of the baby, and I had to spend 15 minutes in class talking about the "evil eye." People here believe that if a baby gets the evil eye, he will get a fever and get sick. Now, I had to proceed carefully with this one, because the priests have told us that there is legitimate black magic that goes on here. These girls, though, believe that if anyone walking down the street looks funny at the baby, it is the evil eye. They put little bracelets on the baby, and bath them in oatmeal and put a raw egg on their head to protect them from the evil eye. My students tend to separate what they learn in school from what they hear outside school, and it can be frustrating for me. I usually sit them down, and quiz them on what they know about the human body from class-- ok, what causes you to get a fever and get sick, and they all answer bacteria and viruses. Then I ask them to think about whether the baby might have an infection, and not the evil eye. I think I get through to some of them- you have to start somewhere!