An optional activity in Siam Reap was going to the home and training grounds of the HeroRATS. Yes, that's a real thing. And, yes, it's really important.
In case you are skeptical, the HeroRATS Visitor Center receives 1,009 five star "excellent" ratings on TripAdvisor, 56 four star "very good" ratings, six "average" three star ratings, zero "poor" and actually one "terrible" one star rating. But that person is from Dallas, which is the city that got a one star "terrible" rating from President John F. Kennedy, so it shouldn't be counted.
(Editor: Oh Lord, the calls and emails we're going to get after this one.)
You see, hero rats are trained to help clear landmines. They can sniff out landmines but don't weigh enough to activate the mines and blow themselves to smithereens. They can also clear significantly more ground during their three hour, 6am to 9am, workday than dogs or people with metal detectors
And, while they are rats, they are much cuter than your average New York City rat, for instance. They are southern giant pouched rats from Africa (I know some are from Tanzania). They work in seventeen different countries around the world clearing landmines and other explosive devices.
So we got to the training facility and Cambodian headquarters just late enough to miss the most recent "tour." So we wandered around the displays in the entry room, biding our time and learning about the hero rates. We learned a lot about the hero rats, who come from Tanzania, have weak eyesight, and take about one year to train.
Once it was our turn, we were joined by other groups who had come in whilst we were waiting our turn. First the guide showed us how the rats clear areas by essentially working grids on maps. Then we watched a rat do a training exercise, sniffing out and indicating the presence of a landmine (the explosive has been long removed, so someone can't mistakenly step on the mine and blow themselves to kingdom come. When the rat finds a landmine, they dig at it, but only for a quarter inch or so -- that's the signal that there's a landmine. The rat then gets a treat for a job well done.
HeroRATS are also used to detect tuberculosis. There are 45 HeroRATS detecting landmines and 31 detecting TB. Another 48 are in training. While they've worked in 17 countries overall, right now they are in seven -- Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, Mozambique, Angola, and Zimbabwe.
APOPO also trains herodogs to sniff out mines. There are 50 HeroDOGS at work in four countries and they have cleared 178 landmines and other explosives.
APOPO was started in 1997 by Bart Weetjens, a Belgian, who was searching for a faster, safer way to detect landmines. Following positive results in several African countries, including Mozambique, they came to Southeast Asia. The minefield was cleared by HeroRATS in 2015, and then the visitor's center than we went to opened in 2017.
The initials (APOPO) is Dutch for Anti-Persoonsmijnen Ontmijnen Product Ontwikkeling, or Anti-Personnel Detection Product Development in English. (I'm proud to say I can pronounce one word of the Dutch title of the organization.
Once trained, the HeroRats work four to five years before they retire. HeroRATS (and HeroDOGS) are trained to detect explosives, and ignore scrap metal. That makes them much faster than humans with a metal detector. One rat can clear 2,200 square feet in around 20 minutes.
Carol doesn't know this until she reads it, but I went to the APOPO website and we are now sponsoring a Cambodian HeroRAT with a modest monthly donation. If that's not cool, I don't know what is. I'm expecting my phone to ring any minute with Carol thanking me for doing such a cool thing.
Oh, and you had better believe I bought a HeroRAT t-shirt. I'm going to wear it with my elephant shorts in the backyard, and together they are going to make a glorious combination of CTDWI -- "Clothes To Drink Wine In" for summers to come. Alas, Carol passed on a HeroRAT t-shirt.
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