Episode 170 – A Chat With Evangelia Pappa, Lena Lekkou, Hacer Yilmaz

Show Notes

Episode Transcript

Topher: Hey everyone. Welcome to Hallway Chats. I’m Topher and my co-host is Sofia. Say hello, Sophia.

Sophia: Sorry. Hello. I was trying to look at the show. 

Topher: Okay. Our guests today come from WordCamp Europe. Please tell us your names and what your role is for WordCamp. 

Evangelia: Hi, my name is Evangelia Pappa. And for WordCamp Europe 2023, I am one of the global leads this year. So I’m responsible for the teams of budgets, sponsors, and the community team. 

Topher: Okay. 

Lena: Hi, I’m Lena Lekkou. I’m responsible for the design. I was the design lead team. What you see and what is printed, what is on the website and what is on the social media is from my team. You can blame us or not. 

Topher: Oh, I can’t hear you anymore. Oh, there we go. 

Hacer: So my name is-

Topher: Now it’s not coming through very well. I don’t know. Maybe it’s the angle.

Hacer: Maybe.

Topher: That’s much better. Yeah. 

Hacer: My name is Hacer Yilmaz. I’m a member of the communications and PR team, and sites, I’ve been involved with adding all of the content to the website and also organizing our relationships with media partners. 

Topher: Oh, you know what? I’m gonna stop us right now. I’m gonna hit record and start over. 

Sophia: It is recording. 

Topher: It is?

Sophia: Yeah.

Topher: No, it’s not. Oh, you are recording? Wonderful. Yeah. All right, then never mind. Okay, great. That’s awesome. I’m glad to have you here. Where are each of you from? 

Evangelia: We are at the moment at Athens Concert Hall. This is the venue of WordCamp Europe 2023 otherwise called Megaron. 

Topher: Yes. But where do you live?

Evangelia: I live in Larissa. It is a city in central Greece. So it is four hours from Athens. 

Topher: And Lena, where do you live? 

Lena: I live here in Athens in Greece. 

Topher: Oh, wow. That’s cool. 

Hacer: I live in Portugal. 

Topher: Okay. I guess I don’t know why I expected more people from outside Greece. But maybe that’s just a false expectation on my part.

Evangelia: Oh, we do have a lot of people from outside Greece. You just hit the jackpot today with me and Lena, two out of three. 

Topher: It is a jackpot. 

Lena: I must say that as a Greek community, we are very involved with WordCamps and with the community as it is. So this is why you might see a lot of Greeks.

Topher: Okay. In general, Greeks are really involved and love organizing events because we have two local WordCamps that we are also planning, a third one in a different city, maybe after WordCamp Europe. However, it’s also a little bit difficult to find people who are able to commit their time and invest being an organizer. You will see this year’s organizing team did have a lot of breaks, in several teams, not only the local team. However, we do have people from all around Europe and also some people from other continents.