Mossad Little Story

Scene: Deep inside a top-secret Mossad training camp, a LEADER is talking to two SOLDIERS.

SOLDIER #1: ...it’s just not working anymore. People recognise me when I go down the street. I buy a litre of milk and the guy at the counter’s, like ‘hey, did ya whack Mohammed whatsisname yet?’

SOLDIER #2: Yeah – I thought we were meant to be, you know, a secret assassination service.

SOLDIER #1: And whose idea was that nude Mossad calendar, anyway? I can’t face my mother-in-law after that. She keeps glancing at my –

LEADER: Sorry, sorry. We were running low on funds and –

SOLDIER #2: It’s the principle of the thing. I shot a guy in an elevator last week and he made kissy-faces at me before he hit the floor in a pool of his own blood. It was embarrassing for both of us. And my daughter only sold ten packets in the Mossad lamington drive. Who thinks of this stuff?

SOLDIER #1: Yeah. We’re just not as secret as we used to be. I was out with my wife in Tel Aviv last month seeing Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Mossad!, and –

SOLDIER #2: Oh, cool – how was it?

SOLDER #1: Great. Steve Martin did an awesome Netanyahu. But Omar Sharif as Arafat? Ham. Anyway, the whole cast clapped me at the end. I was stage-whispering: “secret service! secret service, remember?” – but they just weren’t listening. I’m telling ya: fame’s a double-edged –

LEADER: Ok, ok, point taken. We’ve got a whole raft of new tactics to implement, and –

SOLDIER #2: Don’t give me that management talk. I thought the whole deal was going to be, like, all exciting espionage-type stuff, with grappling hooks and all. This is nothing like that Spielberg movie: there were no porta-loos in that. This is the worst training camp ever.

LEADER: Just listen. This is the next generation of disguises. How would you feel about becoming a citizen of a country so utterly insignificant that most of the world is utterly unaware of its existence?

SOLDIER #1: Canada?

LEADER: Better, much better. Somewhere a million miles from bugger-all. [He upends a cardboard box on the desk. The contents spill out, including two Akubras, two Driza-bones and two pairs of R M Williams boots. The two soldiers gaze in awe.]

SOLDIER #2: That is just –

SOLIDER #1: Brilliant. Utter brilliance. Where did you get all this stuff?

LEADER: Someone left them in the storeroom of their Parliament House for some reason. [Shrugs]. Here are your passports.

SOLDIER #1: Awesome, that’s – wait. You stole me a woman’s passport? Oh, for f**k’s sake.

LEADER: Look, it’s not like we can go in to the airport cafe and say “Oh hello, I’m a Mossad agent, can I please have a soy latte and some passports, please?” Always such ungratefulness!
[Soldiers look at each other in utter disgust.]

LEADER: We can change the photos later, or you could grow your hair a bit

SOLDIER #2: I always thought you’d look good with tits anyway. [Sniggers. SOLDIER #1 punches him.]

LEADER: We thought very carefully about this. It’s a country with worldwide cultural invisibility: the perfect crime. It’s incredible, actually – their Minister for the Arts used to be a rock star! [All laugh]

SOLDIER #1: But that’s impossible. Surely they have, you know, a national cuisine or something?

LEADER: Nup. They ripped it off...wait for it...the English! [LEADER and SOLDIERS erupt into laughter for 5-10 minutes.] No, quieten down, boys, I’m serious. It took them one hundred and fifty years to realise how badly English food sucked.

SOLDIER #2: So what did they do then?

LEADER: They ripped it off everyone else – including us.

SOLDIER #1: The bastards. So how do they talk? Do we need to learn how to speak like them, too?

LEADER: I have taken the liberty of learning their, um, ‘dialect’. [Looks at sheet] Please listen to the following sample sentence and repeat. “Daryl went to a B&S in his lowered Torana. Met a sheila and got a root. Drank shitloads of tinnies and had a prang. Pigs went ballistic. It was a total balls-up.”

SOLDIER #2: And that refers to – ?

LEADER: Mating, gustatory and legal mores.

SOLDIER #1: Wow. I really don’t think I could learn that much in such a short –

SOLDIER #2 [looking at the sheet]: Belt up, mate. Cop it on the chin.

LEADER: That’s the spirit! Soldier #1, why can’t you be more like soldier #2?

SOLDIER #1: There’s something that bugs me about this.

LEADER: Yes?

SOLDIER #1: Aren’t they sort of our...allies? I mean, don’t they just say ‘go for it!’, whatever we do?

LEADER: Yeah, so?

SOLDIER #1: So, why are we stealing their passports and all? Isn’t that, well, mean?

LEADER: Don’t worry: their Government won’t do anything about it.

SOLDIER #1 Ok. [Looking at sheet, speaking hesitantly]: Blood-y...rip-per?

LEADER: That’s the spirit!