To Resemble a City

It was the time when evening gradually settled over the city. The sky had not yet fully darkened; shop lights had turned on, and yellow lamps began to appear in windows. I was passing through a neighborhood I had not visited in years. To shorten my route, I turned down a side street. I was not certain I had ever seen this street before, yet strangely, it did not feel foreign. Some places exist where, even upon first seeing them, it feels as if they have long since taken root in a corner of your memory. Perhaps it is the light from a window, or an old bicycle leaning against a wall, or the familiar quiet of the street that creates this sense. I walked for a while. Then I realized I was not recognizing the street itself, but the feeling it evoked. Sometimes people do not encounter a place, but a part of themselves.

I cannot recall when I first thought of the similarity between cities and people. Perhaps during a long walk, or perhaps while passing through a crowd. But over time I came to realize: there is a strange kinship between trying to understand a person and trying to understand a city. The things seen in the first days are usually the same: squares, main avenues, illuminated shop windows, places everyone knows... People are somewhat the same. In initial encounters, they show only their visible sides—their way of speaking, their habits, the things they love—their surface. But to truly know a city, you sometimes have to step off the map. The same is true for knowing a person.

Because every city has streets that tourists never visit: small squares hidden in the shadows of old apartment buildings, parks known only to neighborhood residents, shops that have stood in the same place for years but no one ever notices... I believe people have such places too. Behind the aspects everyone knows, they carry hidden rooms—childhood resentments, fears never spoken aloud, memories thought long forgotten but suddenly recalled by a single voice... Some people seem easy to read at first glance. But as you draw closer, paths multiply. Corners emerge. Silences begin to acquire meaning.

Perhaps that is why closeness is not something established as quickly as one might think. Adjusting to a city takes time. At first, everything seems confusing: which bus goes where, which street leads where—you do not know. Then, without noticing, your sense of direction develops. You begin to recognize certain corners. You start waiting for certain lights. You memorize certain routes. Getting used to a person is somewhat similar. The silences that initially felt foreign gradually become familiar. You learn when they will stay quiet and when they will speak at length. You begin to anticipate their reactions. But this does not mean you fully know that person. It simply means you have stayed longer in the city.

Some cities appear complex from the outside—crowded, noisy, disordered. Yet as you live within them, you begin to perceive an invisible order. Streets have their own logic. There is a rhythm in which people hold onto each other through invisible bonds. Some people are the same. At first glance, they seem disorganized, indecisive, or contradictory. But as time passes, you realize there is a unique balance within that chaos. On the other hand, some cities appear orderly from the outside, yet it is easy to get lost inside. Perhaps the human soul is not very different from this.

Memory leaves similar traces in both cities and people. Just as the wear of years appears on the walls of an old building, the shadow of lived time lingers on some people’s faces. A street’s name may change, but its former residents still call it by its old name. Sometimes people behave the same way. They say they have changed, yet inside, a voice from years ago continues to live. The past does not fully disappear. It merely settles between layers.

That is why cities returned to after many years feel somewhat melancholic. Because the person believes they have returned to the same place, yet neither the city nor themselves remain the same. The park that seemed gigantic in childhood has shrunk. The building passed daily now looks paler. A corner once so important has become ordinary. But perhaps the real change is not in the city—it is in the eyes that look upon it. The surprise people feel when they meet someone again after many years may stem from this too. The person across from them has changed, of course, but so has the one who sees them.

Sometimes you live in a city but never feel you belong to it. You know its streets, memorize its stops, learn when each light turns on, yet a small sense of foreignness remains within you. Similar things happen in human relationships. There are people we have known for a very long time; they are part of our lives, yet we never fully let them in. Others feel familiar almost immediately—as if we have returned to a street we have known for years. Explaining why is difficult. Perhaps some streets and some people only gain meaning at the right moment.

Perhaps there is a shared quality in loving cities and loving people: both depend not on complete understanding, but on the effort to understand. Because it is impossible to walk every street in a city or to see every corner of a person’s inner world. At some point, we learn to live with what remains incomplete—with unmarked paths, closed doors, unanswered questions.

Evening is growing darker now. As you pass down a street, you glance at a window where the light has turned on. You do not know who lives inside, what kind of life they lead, what thoughts accompany their sleep, or what they feel when they wake in the morning. But you know that behind that window lies a hidden world. Perhaps the same is true when we try to know people: we have as much we cannot see as we have we can see, as much we do not know as we do know.

And perhaps some people truly are like cities. No matter how long you stay, no matter how many streets you walk, there will always be a few you have never entered.