Georgia Kouvela, is a Greek lawyer at the Paris Bar and the Athens Bar, but also President of the Hellenic Institute of Cultural Diplomacy France, which aims to promote Greek culture in France and French culture in Greece.
franceinfo: How did the Greeks experience this period of war in Europe?
Georgia Kouvela : The Greeks don’t like war, don’t like conflicts and that can already be seen in Greek foreign policy. At the level of Turkey, we always try to keep a certain distance, even if the past with the Turks was always painful, and still is, in the minds of the Greeks.
Regarding the upcoming energy crisis, they are experiencing it very, very badly. Especially since we are currently having the effects with the exorbitant rise in electricity prices. We have people who receive between 500 and 600 euros per month in retirement and who have to pay bills of 1000, 1500 euros. It’s amazing, it’s unheard of, unprecedented.
In what political state is Greece today with its leaders?
There is a recovery which translates into a growth which has been put in place gradually and surely, and transparency in the administration, in the justice system, despite a certain increase in unemployment.
What makes the Greeks so strong? They adore their country, what is the Greek who does not know the ancient history, they give the impression that they face all the conflicts because they are first Greek…
The Greeks have a sense of belonging, like all countries for that matter. What defines the nation is this feeling of belonging, to the same History, in the same experience, in the same pain. The Greek pains are still recent. We talk about 1821, the independence of Greece, 1922, the destruction of Smyrna, events that are still recent, and what makes our habits and customs, our culture, always maintain us in a force of unity.
In Greece at primary school, we don’t talk about history, we talk about “knowledge of the homeland”. This is the name of the course given to children between four, five and 12 years old. It is the recognition of the fatherland without nationalist, xenophobic connotations. It is the knowledge of the fatherland, in the sense that this knowledge of our fatherland, it is also to promote it and to accept to be enriched by others. The great strength of the Greeks is to adapt to external elements.
The Greeks love their flag very much, the Greeks, for them it is a great symbol?
Yes, of course, but it’s a flag that was made by blood, by sweat, by work, by a lot of pain. And we have won freedom there. My history teacher told me that if we know the past well, we can live the present and prepare for the future.
It is a people who have a proverb, which perhaps explains what it means to be Greek: “The slower we go, the more we turn sourness into honey”…
Yes, the Greek often forgets, but actually keeps the bad times. Not for protest or revenge. It’s to remember, to learn from past mistakes, and to move on, and maybe become better again afterwards. The Greek is not perfect, but his priorities are to improve this past, for the future…