Gross out? (Activities & Oddities).

WHAT IS IT?

There's a place on Earth where rats aren't horrid pests, but treasured guests. In fact, as many as 20,000 run rampant within the Karni Mata temple in Deshnok, a city in northwest India. These residents of the 17th-century Hindu temple are considered holy: Each day, devotees bring large silver trays laden with offerings like sugar, coconut, and milk for the sacred ones to feast on.

Although a serious house of worship, rat spotting has become prime tourist activity. Following Hindu practice, visitors must remove their shoes before entering. If a rat scampers over your feet, you're considered blessed. And your blessing increases if you spot a rare white rat among a sea of furry browns. Even greater fortune is promised by eating food the holy rodents have drooled on or nibbled.

Surprisingly, "Rat Temple" claims no reported cases of rat bites or rat-related diseases, and when nearby cities were plague-stricken in 1994, Deshnok went unscathed. Rodents infected with the bacterium Yersinia pestis spread plague by fleas; humans contract the contagious, deadly disease through fleabites or exposure to infected animals. Temple followers, however, and many plague victims drank the rats' leftover milk and water as preventive medicine or cure, but whether it worked is uncertain.

While worshipers still think sharing a drink with rats provides divine health miracles, disease ecologist James Mills of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says, "Personally, I wouldn't touch it." Among his reasons: fever and diarrhea-causing salmonella bacteria. Severe flu-like symptoms can result from Leptospirosis, a disease spread by rat urine. Even if the rats were lab-raised and certified disease free, Mills says, "Numerous bacteria live in the digestive system of rats. Humans aren't adapted to these organisms. I don't want an upset stomach."