I called her. She didn’t answer. I sent a message, hoping to move her. Eventually, I found her. Paris? I asked. No, Athens. Why? To study Italian at university. But she already knows Italian. Just like French, English, and German. Not to mention that she translates. Then why? To perfect them. So, the “ecowoman,” as she calls herself, spends four hours a day at her desk.

This is Soti Triantafyllou. She commutes back and forth to France by train. She is bewildered by the Tempi railway tragedy. Given such state chaos, “What amazes me is that we haven’t had more tragedies. We are lucky.”

Soti is now experiencing firsthand the reality of public university institutions: “The building is vandalized from top to bottom. The political youth groups declare occupations whenever they want. Technology has entered our lives, but nothing has changed.”

As for the Trump-Musk duo, “They are incredibly unlikable. Even if they do something right, we still perceive it negatively because they are monstrous figures.” And regarding Kyriakos, “Mitsotakis’ problem is that he drags chaos behind him.

He carries the Karamanlis supporters, the old-school politicians, the remnants of the populist Right that still linger in his party, which he wants to lead towards the Center-Right.” As for the Right-Left dynamic, “The more the Right leans towards the Far Right globally, the more the opposite extreme will emerge.” But enough from me. Let’s hand the microphone to Soti.

Scene 1: “It’s amazing that we haven’t had more accidents”

DIMITRIS DANIKAS: Tell me, do you take the train in France?

SOTI TRIANTAFYLLOU: Of course, I used to take the train.

D.D.: You don’t have a car in Paris, right?

S.T.: No, I don’t have one anywhere anymore. I’ve become an “ecowoman” (laughs).

D.D.: Have you ever been afraid, felt unsafe?

S.T.: No, not at all.

D.D.: And how did you see what happened in Greece?

S.T.: Expected.

D.D.: Why?

S.T.: Not because I knew the condition of the railways. I had no idea, other than that the train is slow, has delays, various structural issues, and the network has shrunk… But considering the way it was, it’s better for it to be smaller and faster rather than a slow train that takes 15 hours to reach its destination. That way, we achieve nothing.

D.D.: Well, that has changed—they reduced it to 4 hours from Athens to Thessaloniki.

S.T.: That’s just theoretical. I took the Intercity, and it took 9 hours, even though they claimed it would take 4.5.

Scene 2: “Nothing Has Changed at EKPA Since 1975”

DIMITRIS DANIKAS: Did you expect more?

SOTI TRIANTAFYLLOU: Greece is a country that was never truly organized. Sometimes, a few superficial improvements happen—useful ones, like digitalization. Let me give you an example. At university, we now have what’s called an online classroom. Professors upload materials, announcements—it’s all nice. We’ve also got a proper student ID now, instead of that dirty little pamphlet we used to carry around. These things are good, but the university remains deeply problematic. First of all, the building is completely vandalized, from top to bottom. Political youth groups declare occupations whenever they want. Technology has entered our lives, but nothing has really changed.

D.D.: Nothing? That sounds unbelievable…

S.T.: I’ve studied at EKPA three times, and nothing has fundamentally changed since 1975, at least from what I see. Professors are at the mercy of political youth groups and various fringe groups. Either they are afraid or they collaborate—I don’t know. But anyone who doesn’t cooperate pays the price. Hasn’t this always been the case? Some things have improved. Graduate programs have been organized, for instance. And maybe the graduate programs function better than the undergraduate ones. But mentalities haven’t changed. The chaos—that word sums us up, unfortunately.

D.D.: So, you’re saying it’s the same story with the railways?

S.T.: Even worse. In general, we’re behind when it comes to risk management, from the individual level to the community level.

D.D.: Violence has increased in recent years—not just in Greece, but globally.

S.T.: Maybe it has, but what’s definitely increased is its visibility. I’m not sure actual violence has risen—it’s just getting more media coverage. For example, I don’t believe violence against women has increased. We just talk about it more now.

D.D.: That’s a good thing.

S.T.: Absolutely. It raises awareness, leads to new legislation. But only recently have we adopted the term “femicide”—which makes sense because it signifies hatred towards a person based on their gender. It’s not just any homicide; it’s a specific kind of homicide. Not that a woman isn’t a person, but she’s attacked precisely because she is a woman. Misogyny is behind femicide.

Scene 3: “I Experienced Violence from My Father”

D.D.: Have you ever experienced violence from a man?

S.T.: First of all, from my father—but he paid a very high price. I left home and never went back, and I never spoke to him again.

D.D.: What can a woman’s revolution be?

S.T.: Not accepting different treatment—what else? Without imitating men’s bad habits. Liberation isn’t about cursing or becoming a football fanatic just because men want you to.

D.D.: So, violence today hasn’t increased, it’s just more visible.

S.T.: Exactly. And it’s also condemned more. Because in the past—you’ll remember this—many crimes against women were called “crimes of passion.” They were crimes of hatred, not passion.

Scene 4: “Woke Culture, a Sign of Decline”

DIMITRIS DANIKAS: Trump?

SOTI TRIANTAFYLLOU: It’s kind of like the Tempi train disaster—I was expecting it to happen. It was a historic event, both in 2016 and now, that seemed inevitable. Maybe we have to go through this phase—first the United States, then the rest of the world.

D.D.: But you love the United States.

S.T.: Not as much as before. I’ve changed a bit. I think what they used to offer us, they don’t anymore. That so-called “soft power” they had—the immense cultural influence—used to be great. But now, they’re in decline in that regard. I’m talking about culture, music, the arts. They no longer produce the same quality because everything has been commercialized to the extreme.

D.D.: And what does Trump represent?

S.T.: First of all, the people who voted for him did so for two main reasons. The first is as a reaction to woke culture, which has permeated all institutions in the United States and is extremely irritating for many Americans—not just them, but also for culture itself. Despite its good intentions, it’s a sign of cultural decline. On the other hand, there were economic concessions the U.S. had made regarding free trade. To liberalize trade, many Americans found themselves at a disadvantage compared to Canada or Mexico. So, their demand was economic protectionism—which doesn’t really exist.

D.D.: Isn’t that strange? The triumph of American capitalism was its openness. Now that it’s closing itself off, it’s turning into Soviet-style capitalism.

S.T.: Protectionism definitely has a socialist feel to it.

D.D.: If China imposes tariffs on American products, the U.S. will lose a billion customers.

S.T.: Not exactly—it depends on what products we’re talking about and whether they can be manufactured in China. We’ll see. What affects us more is that the Trump-Musk duo is incredibly unlikable as personalities. It’s very hard to sympathize with them. Even if they do something right, we still perceive it negatively because they’re monstrous figures. One is worse than the other.

---

Scene 5: “Russian Propaganda Has Infiltrated Social Media”

D.D.: Isn’t it chilling that a man who told Americans to drink bleach to cure COVID got elected?

S.T.: A large part of the population is deeply ignorant, full of prejudices, superstitions, and religious fanaticism. Religious extremism in the U.S. fuels ideologies and threatens rights. And even though Trump has no real connection to religion—he hasn’t read the Bible, he’s clueless—he still managed to represent evangelical Protestants, who are very powerful, especially in the South.

D.D.: What about Macron?

S.T.: He’s been trying to wake us up for years.

D.D.: Do you still support Macron?

S.T.: I don’t see another alternative. This is who we have, so we’ll stick with him until 2027.

D.D.: They say Le Pen will win in 2027.

S.T.: We’ll see what happens in the next year and a half. I believe her party has reached its ceiling—around 30%, no higher. But in the meantime, other forces need to emerge to address the issues where Le Pen actually has a point, in her own way. Things like lawlessness, the justice system—which is slow and lenient, much like Greece’s—and the issue of Islamic influence. She’s not wrong about these things. The problem is, she is who she is. So you can’t trust her. She has neither honest roots nor honest alliances, and she attracts dark forces. She’s not even like Giorgia Meloni, who, despite admiring Mussolini as a great patriot, is pro-European and willing to cooperate.

D.D.: Europe is going through a tough time right now. Isn’t it a bit weak?

S.T.: But when was it strong? I think it has simply expanded too much, leading to phenomena like Hungary, which no longer fits in the EU. Hungary should leave because its government is pro-Russian, which makes it anti-European at this moment—because Putin is attacking us in various ways.

D.D.: Meaning?

S.T.: Mainly through propaganda. What Mitsotakis said about bots is old news. For over 15 years, Russian propaganda has infiltrated social media and traditional media, spreading pro-Russian ideas.

D.D.: And is there a pro-Russian political party?

S.T.: There are parties that generally align with Russia, either because of Orthodoxy or a deep-rooted Russophilia that dates back to the Soviet era.

D.D.: But could they be on the payroll…?

S.T.: I don’t know. What I do know is that there are frequent cyberattacks in many countries, especially those that were part of the Soviet bloc—Romania, Ukraine, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan—aimed at influencing public opinion. And all those conspiracy theories about Putin’s influence in Brexit or the 2016 U.S. elections—I think they should be taken into account, at least partially.

Scene 6: “The Accident and Its Chaotic Investigation”

D.D.: Now, with the Tempi train crash, beyond the spontaneous public reaction expressed in those massive, grand protests, is this propaganda working?

S.TR.: There is certainly a conspiracy side to it. Some people claim that there was an illegal cargo being transported by the Mitsotakis family. Honestly, I find that hard to believe.

D.D.: I don’t believe it either.

S.TR.: Others say there was cargo related to national security, NATO, for example. I think these ideas are childish. What seems more plausible is that both the accident and its investigation were handled in a chaotic manner, due to the chaotic state our country is in. We acknowledge that we are a dysfunctional state, that we cause such tragedies because we can’t organize a safe railway system. Why wouldn’t we accept that we are also incapable of properly investigating the accident? Since we are incapable. There were reports of landfilling, nonsense, mistakes, foreign and local experts getting involved. But when we talk about “cover-up,” we have to complete the sentence. Cover-up of what? Of who is to blame? Of course, Mr. Karamanlis, who was the Minister of Transport, is symbolically responsible because he was in charge of the railway system.

D.D.: Not just symbolically—he even stated that the trains were safe.

S.TR.: When I say “symbolically,” I mean he didn’t directly cause the accident. What he should have done was go into hiding. But instead, he ran for election, and the people of Serres voted for him. So, half the shame is his, and the other half belongs to the people of Serres—and all of us.

Scene 7: “Public Schools… Wild Animal Enclosures”

D.D.: Are you with Mitsotakis?

S.TR.: I voted for him. We’re not close friends.

D.D.: Do you still trust him?

S.TR.: I don’t have another choice. I believe he genuinely wants to change things. Also, I think there are certain things he simply can’t change, firstly due to legislation itself. We talked about universities earlier. Can he bring order to universities? No, he can’t. The opposing forces are such that he cannot influence their autonomy. The law would have to change, which, of course, will never happen. Can he change, let’s say, the anarchy in public spaces? People voted for him for such reasons—for order. But the moment he tries to impose order, a large part of the public opposes it. It’s not easy.

For starters, he doesn’t have a majority—he never did. The so-called 41% is not a majority. This is a minority government and will remain a minority government. The only exception was Andreas Papandreou, who dismantled everything. He had the entire public with him, and he had them in the way a charismatic leader does—with a kind of personality cult, at least in the early years.

Another problem Mitsotakis has is that he carries chaos behind him. He drags along the Karamanlis faction, old-school politicians, remnants of the populist right that still exist in his party, which he is trying to steer toward the center-right.

D.D.: Is there an alternative solution?

S.TR.: I don’t see one. Others do. They believe that left-wing parties could cooperate and form a nice government (laughs). But I don’t trust the Left because I disagree with its values—and, of course, its hypocrisy regarding those values.

We need a stronger government, but for that to happen, Mitsotakis must do certain things to convince more people. He needs to implement the reforms he promised—administrative reform, a deeper one, not just digital. For example, in the railway system. Also in education, where there are many pathologies. There are public schools that are like wild animal enclosures. There are neighborhoods that have been abandoned.

Overall, we are not satisfied with what has been done in recent years. We expected much more.

Scene 8: “Religion is the Opium of the People”

D.D.: Ah, now we’ve arrived at our conversation. What happened with that incident, with the vandalism?

S.TR.: In reality, it doesn’t impress me. And we shouldn’t really be focusing on Mr. Papadopoulos. The police should have just arrested him, lifted his immunity, and let the matter take its course and remain in the police report. What perhaps adds more weight to it is that, if I understood correctly, the Church intervened.

D.D.: The Holy Synod. They said they would take appropriate action.

S.TR.: Alright. Religion is the opium of the people. Most Greeks don’t want the Church to be separated from the State; they don’t want that.

D.D.: Shouldn’t it be?

S.TR.: Of course, it should. But if they don’t want it, how can it happen? What I’m trying to say is that governments try to please the majority. A little from here, a little from there. Of course, if you try to please everyone, in the end, you please no one. But that’s democracy—you try to please the majority.

D.D.: Are you trying to say that society in Greece is, for the most part, backward?

S.TR.: We’re still in an immature stage. But I don’t want to say we’re more backward than other societies, because someone could argue that the United States has elected the monster of nature. On the other hand, why shouldn’t we recognize the artist’s right to mock, let’s say, religion?

D.D.: That’s always happened in the past. Francis Bacon, for example.

S.TR.: It’s always happened. And honestly, in 2025, religion is an easy target. It’s so kitsch, all of its symbols are so simplistic that you can easily overturn them. There’s nothing complicated about attacking the icons. The iconoclasts did it; it’s an old issue. But the fact that a parliament member goes into a gallery and vandalizes it means they believe in impunity.

Scene 9: “We’re Managing, We Haven’t Slaughtered Each Other”

D.D.: So, even a student would vandalize. I disagree with the professor, I’ll wall him in, I’ll destroy the university.

S.TR.: Exactly, since everyone remains unpunished. There are no consequences. But, to be fair, I think we’re a marvelous society; because without punishment, we’re still managing—haven’t slaughtered each other. We are a society with such legal looseness that things could be much, much worse. And that should be studied—how each of us has a certain limit, and somewhere we brake. Because there’s no other measure outside of us that holds us back. Nothing holds back tax evasion, financial crimes, family issues, nothing. Only the Kantian morality that we might have inside us.

D.D.: Tell me, your latest book was “Listen to the Lion.” What’s the next one?

S.TR.: It’s coming out in a few days, at the end of March or early April. A novel titled “The Blind Pig on Second Street.”

D.D.: What kind of novel is it? Is it a romance?

S.TR.: No, goodness! I never write romance. I’m not interested; everyone writes about that. It’s an overestimated topic.

D.D.: Do you avoid writing romantic stories?

S.TR.: Love exists in my books, but it’s never a romance novel. I’m not inspired by it. There are other social issues that interest me. Also, my background as a historian has a strong influence on me—it stamps me as a writer. I’m interested in things that have happened in society.

D.D.: Historically, which period do you focus on the most?

S.TR.: Mainly the Cold War, that’s my field. But of course, since it was my field, starting in the 1980s, I’ve expanded it.

Epilogue: “I Miss the Real Socialism”

And just when I thought our conversation had ended, he sent me off with the phrase, “Anyway, I miss the real socialism.”

D.D.: What did you just say? You’re driving me crazy…

S.TR.: Not for Russia, but for us. Things were clearer back then. Also, with the Soviets, although there was espionage and all that, you could communicate on five things. Because they too were trying to do good for their country, in the way they understood it. Whereas Putin doesn’t care about doing good for his country. He’s an oligarch; he doesn’t care about the broader people. Also, NATO had a very specific role: the containment of communism. It had a purpose. Now, it doesn’t know what it has; it’s disoriented.

D.D.: So, this confusion bothers you a lot.

S.TR.: This confusion could lead us to tremendous global disorder. Because we have no principles, no values.

D.D.: To wrap up, what’s your sense about the future in Greece? Will Kyriakos make it out of the problem he’s facing?

S.TR.: I believe we should not underestimate the power of the Left. It has immense strength in society, immense persuasive power. I mean, something that the Left says, no matter how absurd it might be, becomes believable. While from the Right, it doesn’t become believable. And this happens for two reasons. The first is that they have more experience with propaganda; they know how to channel it in a romantic way, with a humanitarian touch, with tears, while the Right is clumsy at this. The second is that the moral advantage still survives, despite everything we’ve lived through. Because the criminal history of the Left, the fact that they’ve killed their own, cannot be believed. Everything is attributed to misinformation.

D.D.: However, the instrumentalization of this history doesn’t help them. Their numbers are falling, and Zoi Konstantopoulou is rising.

S.TR.: I think this rise is temporary. Anyway, maybe they won’t recover politically, but ideologically, they are recovering. Because with what’s happening in the world, which is considered a rightward shift or even far-right at times, there is a backlash. There is a left-wing backlash, and in fact, an ultra-left backlash. The more the Right moves toward the Far Right globally, the more the other extreme will grow.