I was born and lived in a small town in Italy for the first ~30 years of my life, with small breaks in Rome, Los Angeles and a few others. Then lived in Luxembo

I was born and lived in a small town in Italy for the first ~30 years of my life, with small breaks in Rome, Los Angeles and a few others. Then lived in Luxembourg, Singapore (two years each), and 9 years in San Francisco. The noise in San Francisco was terrible. You could hear the highway at all times, and of course you could hear the trash truck 3 days a week, usually twice in the same night (1am or 2am, and 3am or 4am - how DUMB). My sleep quality, you can guess, was pretty bad. I bet I lost 1-2 years of lifespan just for this. I'm not kidding, and please do not assume I'm exaggerating either. And then of course the occasional gunshots (once or twice a year - I lived in the Mission district), of the frequent police or firefigthers sirens. It often felt like VIOLENCE. A first world problem, yes (especially when considering that you are surrounded by homeless people) but violence nonetheless. For the past 1.5 years I've been living mostly in Venezia, Italy. (you can call it Venice, I found that sometimes when I say Venice, without "Italy", people assume Venice in Los Angeles. What a dumb thing). Venice is incredibly silent. You can occasionally hear a motor boat, but that's it, maybe with just a few contained exceptions (Campo Santa Margherita at night, where lots of youngsters gather to drink and make quite some noise). I love it. I think you can fully understand only if you have lived for a long period in the countryside. Otherwise, it's really hard to understand the positive impact of a silent city, and a silent night. New York will never be like Venezia, but I bet they can improve things a lot.