Page 24 - MLT December

frontline
Passions
by Paul Jablow
NEXT STOP
New York City
There are few better places to get into the holiday spirit than New York City. Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanzaa, here’s what you don’t want to miss.
It wouldn’t be a trip to Manhattan during the holidays without a visit to Rockefeller Center. See the massive tree aglow throughout the month. This year’s lighting takes place Dec. 4.
OWest Chester University’s Oné Pagán embraces the oddness of nature.
né Pagán sees it as the ultimate plant and part animal. Explaining the way challenge faced by any college plants get energy from the sun, he asked professor: Holding the interests the students to imagine going out onto the of students who in many cases campus, raising their arms and saying, don’t want to be there. It’s nothing “Let’s make lunch.”
personal. His students seem to A short walk from the lecture hall, in his
Survival of the Weirdest
like him. For most, however, his “Basic Biological Sciences for Non-Majors” course at West Chester University is a way to satisfy the school’s science requirement. “I’ve got to keep them entertained as well as educated,” says Pagán.
To do so, he punctuates his 45-minute lectures with “Are you with me?” “How cool is this?” and “Make sense?” as he paces back and forth and scans the crowd for nods.
He spices his explanations of complicated biological processes with memorable examples like a solar-powered sea slug that’s part
22 December 2019 | www.mainlinetoday.com
office/lab, Pagán indulges his other side. A serious scholar who’s been published in the International Journal of Developmental Biology, he also relishes forays into the world of popular science—like his latest book, Strange Survivors: How Organisms Attack and Defend in the Game of Life.
An odyssey through some of the strangest nooks and crannies in the animal kingdom, it introduces creatures like the electric catfish, a scorpion whose two venoms
are utilized based on how seriously it’s threatened, flatworms that can generate
Lace up your skates and take to the ice at Wollman Rink in Central Park or the Rink at Rockefeller Center.
Two of the world’s largest menorahs reside in New York City. Each year the Grand Army Plazas in Brooklyn and Manhattan attempt to outdo one another with 32-foot, 4,000-pound versions. See both Dec. 22-30.
The glitzy and glamorous Rockettes host their Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall Nov. 8-Jan. 5.
The Dec. 28 American Museum of Natural History Kwanzaa celebration features African dance, live music, traditional crafts and more.
—Lisa Dukart
PASSIONS: TESSA MARIE IMAGES