Bruce Feiler - Where God Was Born, Abraham, Walking The Bible

No Wonder
Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Nothing stirs up controversy like the seven wonders.

A few months ago I participated in picking the "New Seven Wonders of the World" for "Good Morning America" and USA Today. Six of us were locked in a room for seven hours and not allowed to leave until we had come up with a list, made all the more challenging because the organizers insisted we mix natural and human-made wonders. To see our final list, click here; to read an essay I wrote about one of the seven, click here. Hint: It's holy for half the world's believers. Not surprisingly, few people loved our list.

Now another effort to unveil the "New Seven Wonders" by online vote has come under attack: Not for something off the list, but for something on the list. Zahi Hawass, the prince of Egypt's antiquities, has criticized the effort, the winnders of which will be unveiled on 07/07/07, for making the pyramids compete alongside the other nominees.

The pyramids are "living in the hearts of people around the globe, and don't need a vote to be among the world wonders," said the head of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, Zahi Hawass, according to the state-run Middle East News Agency.
Egyptian officials refused to meet with the organizer of the "New 7 Wonders of the World" contest, the Swiss adventurer Bernard Weber, when he visited Egypt earlier this month, said the contest's spokeswoman Tia B. Viering. When Weber tried to hold a press conference near the pyramids, she said, police shut it down.

I met Hawass in a similar-sounding meeting that's described in WALKING THE BIBLE, and certainly anyone who has ever filmed at the pyramids, as we did for WALKING THE BIBLE on PBS (see the image on the upper right hand corner of this page) has had similar encounters.

Labels: Middle East, Pop Culture

Posted by B Feiler at 8:00 AM
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