FAME, Zahi Hawass explains, is something you crave until you have it. He points to the Indiana Jones-style hat parked on a table beside him. “If I put this on and go outside,” he says, “I’ll be mobbed.” Then the 79-year-old archaeologist, clad in denim, his hair tinted a matching blue, clamps the hat on his head and stomps to the door. No sooner does he emerge into the atrium of the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza than he is mobbed…
This article first appeared in the FT Magazine on 18 July 2026. To continue reading, click here (paywall).