I have lived in Athens, Greece for the better part of my life. It might not be a major city, but it is big nonetheless. And old. I have lived in 8 different homes, in 6 different neighborhoods. I have lived in the center and I have lived in the suburbs. And I have seen with my own eyes how different every part of the city is and at the same time how similar they all are.
As a child I always wanted to live abroad. Attending a foreign private school, speaking English every day for the first 11 years of my life, and then suddenly having to attend a Greek school, and then a different Greek school, and then a different one again, I swore I was going to study abroad and live there and never have to speak Greek again. And when finances didn't allow it, I accepted my fate and went to a Greek University.
Apparently, that was the turning point in how I view the city, because when I had the opportunity to live abroad (Munich, Germany), at 21, I rejected it. I had grown to love Athens so much, and my love for this city grows every day. I'm at a point where I feel overwhelmed about how much attached I have grown to it. Not one specific part, but all of it.
Everyone loves the place they grew up in like no one else has ever loved a place
My first encounter with someone loving the place they grew up in was with my father. He grew up in a small village named Gllava, in the mountains of Tepelene, Albania. I've been to that village and as a child, I couldn't see what was so special about it that he craved to lived there again someday. Every year, on New Years Eve, after a glass of wine or two, he would reminisce and get lost in his stories about his village. Mom did the same about the town she grew up in, a town called Memaliaj, also in Tepelene, Albania.
A couple of years ago, when kids my age started splitting and leaving for Europe and the States and Canada and the Philippines, I started receiving messages of nostalgia. Messages about how much they missed their neighborhood. Neighborhood, mind you, not Athens. They only missed the place they grew up in.
The rest that stayed in Athens and had to move to a different part of the city also found it difficult and wanted to return to their old neighborhoods. My classmates from Cholargos (northern suburbs) only wanted to live there, and so did my classmates from Patissia (downtown Athens). It reminded me of my parents' nostalgia and I came to realize that I don't feel that. I haven't lived in one place for that long to bond with one neighborhood. I left Cholargos at 17 after 11 years of residence and that was a shock back then, but two years later I was over it. It's not like I can't commute to see my friends in the other side of the city.
The funny thing is that when I tell them that everyone I know love their childhood neighborhood and refuse to live someplace else, they don't accept it. Only their neighborhood is special. And no one can ever love a place as much as they love the place they grew up in.
People are different, nevertheless the same
It goes without saying that Athens is informally divided into zones. The poorer households live in the center of the city and as you move outward, you'll find wealthier neighborhoods. The center also hosts immigrants and refugees, while the suburbs don't (unless they're wealthy immigrants). Going to school in different parts of the city, at first glance you'd think that they're totally different.
With the wealthier kids having laser hair removal since they were 13. Everyone speaks 3 languages by the time they're 10. They can afford to attend to sports and music classes etc. They know exactly what they want to do in their lives. What college they want to apply to, and some of them even have a list of charities they want to attend to when they are old enough to handle their own money. Of course, not everyone knows what they want to do and knowing what you want to do does not mean you won't have a change of heart in the future.
The most outrageous thing I've heard a rich kid say (not directly to me) one day they had left their wallet at home and couldn't buy the icecream they wanted: "Now I know how the homeless feel."
In the poorer neighborhoods you'll find teenagers waiting tables by the time they hit 14, just so they can afford to pay for their dance classes and go after the life they want. I've seen teenagers even raise their younger siblings because their parents had to take 3 jobs to pay rent. Refugees roam the streets with no purpose. There are less trees, much traffic and tall grey buildings. When I first moved to the center of Athens at 17 years old (I also lived there as a baby, but have no memory of it) I was shocked by how few trees were planted and how few gardens there were. I've always loved plants. And then, one afternoon, as I was sitting on my balcony, sipping on my tea, preparing for the next day, I saw a man scavenge the garbage bins in the streets. I never complained about few gardens again.
What comes as a shock, is that the center of Athens, where diversity thrives, also seems to host more racists. At least at first glance. Racism comes in all shapes and sizes and is able to disguise itself.
The overwhelming differences among the people from different parts of Athens go away once you come to know them. People have emotions and although those emotions present themselves in different forms, they are nonetheless the same. And the main goal of every single person, I believe, is to be happy. Whether you work "weird" jobs to support your family or if you work at your dad's business, your main goal is to get to the point where you are truly and completely satisfied with where you're at. Happiness might mean something different to each of us, but the feeling we receive when we've achieved it is the same.*
People all around Athens are passionate. Some are outspoken, others are not. Shy, courageous, loving, cold, naïve, kind, a-holes, they exist all over the city. And you can spot them everywhere you go. People are the same. They were solely given different opportunities in life.
Pride and Prejudice
Just as everyone loves their neighborhood, they take pride in it, too. Since I didn't grow up in one neighborhood alone, I'll name the pros of the two extremes as I have experienced them.
Downtown Athens:
Convenience when it comes to commuting.
Cheaper costs in groceries.
Diversity
Noise
Suburbs:
Less traffic
More trees
Quiet
I put both noise and quiet as a positive feature because I appreciate both depending on the time of the day. When I lived in the center, I loved to listen to the noisy highway after the sun went down. And now, back in the suburbs after so many years, I appreciate the quiet stillness 6:00 am has to offer me. 6:00 am wasn't as quiet in the building I previously lived as I had neighbors waking up at 4:30 to get to work.
People all around the city take pride in the neighborhood they grew up in. So much so they believe they would never find a place as nice and as sentimental as the town of their childhood upbringing. And that has led many people become prejudiced against the other areas of the city. Which is insane. Having lived all around, at various stages of my life, it's not the tragedy they make it seem.
I love Athens. All of it. The good, the bad and the ugly. The people, the architecture, the streets. I can't imagine living elsewhere. ;)
I'm kidding, of course. I would live anywhere.
*It doesn't matter if one is wealthier than the other, they could also be miserable.
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