It seems that every week we have some good news here. I was very happy earlier this week when four objects were returned to the Egyptian Museum.

The people who were caught with antiquities from the Egyptian Museum were sentenced to 15 years in jail and fined heavily. I hope through these strict punishments we will deter people from dealing in antiquities here. It seems that the people who entered the Museum on the night of January 28^th knew they could not do anything with these objects. They cannot sell them because no one will buy them, they have been publicized. They also cannot keep them because of the penalties. However, one of them had a conscience, because he took a bag and put it in a metro station, and by accident a person opened the bag and saw artifacts inside. At 9 am I found this person on the steps of my office with the bag. I opened it and was amazed to see these missing objects!

The objects were: a gilded statue of King Tut, the lower part is in the Museum and it will be restored. Also a wooden shabti of Yuya and Tjuya that came back in excellent condition, so we will put it back on display right away.  Another object was a fan that had been damaged, which we will also restore and return to display. The last object is the two pieces of the trumpet, which is also still in good condition.

We are still missing 37 objects from the Egyptian Museum, but I hope that soon we will be able to find them all and return them to the Museum.