rat

A new legend is born! Meet the hero from Cambodia who's got the whole world buzzing -- Magawa! And Magawa just so happens to be a giant African pouched rat. Magawa isn't just any rat, he was trained to sniff out landmines and has now been awarded British charity's top civilian award for animal bravery!

In the past seven years, Magawa has discovered a total of 39 landmines and 28 items of unexploded ordnance. People's Dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA) start began as a free vet clinic in 1917 and has been honoring heroic animals 1943. Magawa was awarded the PDSA's gold medal for his "lifesaving bravery and devotion," according to the charity.

Having cleared over 141,000 square meters of land (imagine 20 soccer fields), it is without a doubt that Magawa is worthy of this award! 

APOPO Chief Executive Christophe Cox had this to say about the heroic act, "it is big for the people in Cambodia, and all the people around the world who are suffering from landmines. The PDSA Gold Medal award brings the problem of landmines to global attention."

But why use rats to sniff out landmines? Turns out, rats are perfect for such a task! Their small size (and weight) allows them to walk across minefields without triggering any explosives. Before Magawa, this was a canine job. 

PDSA also happens to have a Dickin Medal for military service and the medal has since been awarded to 34 dogs, 32 pigeons, 4 horses, and one cat. However, Magawa is their rat to ever receive a PDSA award! 

Congratulations Magawa, thank you for your bravery and helping make this world a safer place for us all. 

Story via The Guardian

Roommate drama can get intense, like when this roommate refused to pay rent or this roommate who thought she was being sneaky. Just the small act of getting a full-grown child to do their dishes can be a pain. Luckily, this person figured out a prank that made a solution very graceful and easy.

Amalie Markota Andersen has taught her pet rat, Darius, to do something quite extraordinary -- paint! Anderson herself is an animation and digital arts student and told The Insider that it only took Darius roughly 10 minutes to complete a masterpiece.

Darius used his feet to create his work and his painting have gone viral multiple times on Twitter and Tumblr. He's sold about 3 or 4 pieces. 

Unfortunately, the talented Darius passed away earlier in 2019. Anderson says her and Darius had a special bond and we're 100% sure of that.

Darius and his paintings have been going viral on the internet since this past Saturday, when pictures of him and his work were shared by a now-private account. 

Story via The Insider

Rainbow lover and mutual oral-sex lover Tekashi 6ix9inetestified last week about his involvement with the Nine Trey Bloods gang last week, and allegedly gave up information on members as high profile as Cardi B. and Jim Jones. The rapper's quickness to snitch on members has led to an explosion of memes mocking his ratting, and many of them are insanely funny. In the age of the internet, snitches don't just have to worry about getting stitches. They've got to worry about getting meme'd. And we love it.

This thread was in response to this news of a couple in Mongolia who ate raw Marmot organs and subsequently died of Plague. The story itself is pretty tragic, but where i gets interesting is this tumblr user shooting down everyone's knee-jerk reactions to the headline without actually reading the thing. In very tumblr fashion, the thread turned into a conversation about the realities of veganism, sort of like this tumblr post that called out vegans for not eating honey.

While it may be harder for some people to relate to rats like they do to cats and dogs, we're here to remind you, especially on world rat day,  that they're just about the cutest animals ever!  

This chunky rodent had a bit of a situation...A team of firefighters had to be called in the German town of Bensheim when a rat was unable to get out of a sewer manhole due to his girth.

If your morning is starting a bit slow, perhaps you need a role model. Someone with a can-do spirit and the courage to dream big. What you need is this rat from Washington DC, who caused a stir in a condo building after it set off a fire alarm. Residents had to be evacuated, but there was no one harmed.