By ABC's Elizabeth Hartfield
To an outside observer, Athens, Greece would appear to be the obvious pick for the summer Olympics. But getting a winning bid for the country where the games originated was actually a lot more difficult, writes Gianna Angelopoulos, who headed up the committee that oversaw Greece's bid, in her book "My Greek Drama."
In 1996 when Angelopoulos was appointed to head up the committee, she went into the process assuming the same position as any other country, instead of approaching it as though it was the country's right of passage.
"We wanted to win by merit" she told ABC's George Stephanopoulos, "not by right."
Angelopoulos, a former member of Greece's Parliament and the former employer of ABC's multi-platform anchor during the Olympic bid, writes about the highs and lows of her Olympic journey in her book, which was released in May, 2013: Covering Greece's struggle to bring the Olympics back to the country-- which had not hosted the event since 1896--- to get them
Read More »from President of the bidding and organizing committee for 2004 Olympics in Athens: “We wanted to win by merit, not by right.”