In a country where the family is a strong marker of society, “call me when you arrive” summary “the mentality of parents in Greece, especially the mother who worries about whether her child is doing well”explained Pinelopi Horianopoulou, a fifty-year-old mother of two children, municipal employee, met by AFP on Wednesday in the Athens demonstration. “This is the message that all mothers in Greece send”adds Giota Tavoulari, 58, of the pharmacists’ union. “It is taken up everywhere because it is quite significant: these children will not see their families again because governments, companies have not taken care” railway safety systems.
In a few days, “acall me when you arrive“has become the equivalent for indignant Greece of the “I can’t breathe”the slogan appeared in the United States after the death in May 2020 of the African-American George Floyd, suffocated under the knee of a white policeman.
In the processions that marched across the country on Wednesday, banners displayed this sentence which spread like wildfire on social networks in the hours following the train accident. In Athens, angry youths also chanted: “Send me a message when you arrive. You never arrived. We’ll get revenge on you, kid.”