Your RDA of Irony

Borrowing a Snowball’s Chance in Hell

EGYPT SEEKS LOANS OF OVERSEAS ARTIFACTS
 
Egypt said Sunday it would seek the temporary return of some of its most precious artifacts from museums abroad, including the Rosetta Stone and a bust of Nefertiti.

The country’s chief archaeologist, Zahi Hawass, said the Foreign Ministry would send letters this week to France, Germany, the United States and Great Britain requesting that the ancient artifacts be loaned to Egypt.

The Egyptian request did include a self-addressed stamped envelope.  Unfortunately, the responses were not encouraging.   

Britain offered the DVD of “Caesar and Cleopatra” in return for a temporary loan of the Suez Canal.  A spokesman for the Bush Administration explained America’s refusal:  transporting the murals of scantily-clad ancient Egyptians might violate postal regulations against pornography.  France refused, dismissing the Egyptians as aesthetic inferiors who would not appreciate their own art.  Germany found it pleasantly surprising to have “borrowed” anything without having caused a war.

In a related development, Egypt’s Treasury Department has asked to borrow the syndication rights to “Seinfeld.”  Filing a lien on intellectual property rights, Egypt has identified Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David as escaped Hebrew slaves.

  1. Bob Kincaid says:

    Tell ya what, Mr. Hawass. As soon as you can guarantee that all your antiquities, legacies of the whole human race that they are, won’t be destroyed by religious maniacs who think seeing a picture of someone will send them to Hell, we’ll talk. After all, those statues of the Compassionate Buddha at Bamyan in Afghanistan were right there where they’d been for millenia, and the locals turned them into dust.

    Egypt has a better long-term chance of continuing to see the Rosetta Stone outside of Egypt than it would if the stone was back “home.”

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