I’ve previously written about Apopo, a wonderful charity that uses African Giant Pouched Rats and trained dogs to do incredible things like detecting land mines and tuberculosis. Though my first post was a joke about their name, I’ve been a supporter for over a decade. I adopted a rat as a special gift, and more recently, I celebrated the medal a very special HeroRat named Magawa received.

Last year, I even attended a virtual retirement party in Magawa’s honor, wearing this shirt:

The back of this shirt says “Rats are friends”, which is just delightful.

Granted, this was a bit like wearing a band’s shirt to their concert. Still, I didn’t care. One didn’t need to play it cool with Magawa, because he kept it cool enough for everyone.

Alas, as that past tense hinted, Magawa is no longer with us. After a lifetime spent helping others, he enjoyed his retirement before passing away at the very respectable age of eight years old. Rest in peace, but not in pieces, Magawa.

But though one HeroRat has left us, many others remain, and Apopo carries on with their important work. Join me in supporting them right here.

They train rats to save lives.