The first three years of my life in the United States, corn was on one side of the road and soybean on the other, or vice versa.

And if I went down the road for more than 5 miles in any direction, I became an out-of-towner.

This past year, though, I became a citizen of the biggest, baddest city in the world, with a job in an advertising agency in the Mecca of global advertising – Madison Avenue in Manhattan.

This past week, I came back home to Ames, unable to take the peace, tranquility and camaraderie of New York and its residents any longer. Now amidst the incredibly loud bustle and noise of birds chirping and grass being mowed all around town, I can hardly hear myself speak.

I really do miss the calm and quiet of New York City. Nowhere else will you find people’s hands reaching out to honk at other motorists faster than their feet can reach the brakes. Past masters of Zen will tell you this is an incredible tolerance building experience.

Plus, for a soft-spoken person like me (read “mumbler”), it helped increase the decibel levels of my vocabulary delivery.

Talking about tolerance and concern for others, nowhere else will you find cab drivers who are so solicitous about other drivers that they never hog a whole lane by themselves – they just straddle two lanes in the center, leaving half a lane on each side for you to attempt your death wish.

And while you’re being treated to a live session of Frogger, those eyes estimate whether to give you a dirty look because you’re not going to tip the cabby, or to dismiss you as a gawking tourist and hand you your throbbing heart – through your mouth – into your hand at the end of the dizzying, I mean delightful, ride.

If you prefer a different mode of traversing this 11 mile long and 2 mile wide little strip of land, there’s always the subway.

Fear not if you think there’s a chance of getting lost in the labyrinth of MTA’s rail network.

You can get a free subway map of the entire rail network that will remove all doubt and get you thoroughly confused and lost. And if you still manage to get onto the right train and get off the train at the right stop, don’t despair. You can still get lost trying to find the exit to the street you really want to go to.

During the summer months, the MTA makes it even simpler to get lost. Due to construction at a lot of the stations, trains don’t stop there. So you can go where you don’t want to, and try to figure your way out.

Personally, I think they hired the same guys who built the insides of the Egyptian pyramids to design the subway system in New York.

Once you have reached level ground again (you’ll know this when a cab shaves a quarter inch off your skin), and you can feel the warmth of the smoggy sunshine, you might be looking to grab a bite to eat. New York City’s the right place to be for that.

It’s all about the food all right, which means you shouldn’t really be finicky about the silverware, the tools that provide an alternative to eating with your hands, or the tablecloths, or the fact that you can’t see the floor.

After all, you’re there for the food, aren’t you? On the other hand, if you aren’t there for the food, there are lots of ritzy joints where it’s not about the food at all.

For an amount that approximately equals all your school loans, you can find designer d‚cor, the finest china, sparkling silverware, a whole host of waitstaff whose clothes would probably put yours to shame, soothing music, and even food that looks like it’s been prepared by somebody who went to design school rather than a culinary college.

Another thing you should know about New Yorkers is they pretty much keep to themselves. And to their cell phones, portable computers and PDAs.

These people are so considerate about not listening to other people using mobile phones in the train, bus or on the street, they will glare at any person that is not talking on a mobile phone themselves.

So remember to beg, borrow or steal a cell phone when you go to New York. It might just come in handy if you need to find a hospital for a quick skin graft from cabby contact.

Narayan Devanathan is a graduate student in journalism and mass communication from Hyderabad, India.