The Millennium Park's pièce de résistance is the sculpture by Mumbai-born, London-based and internationally acclaimed architect, Anish Kapoor…. His mammoth bean-shaped creation baptised 'Cloud Gate' - which Chicagoans with a singular lack of imagination call 'The Bean' - is a tribute to this city's past and future

Having lived in 'The Windy City' for two years, Rukhmini Punoose catches herself in time from succumbing to Chicago's New York hangover. And instead pitches for all the scores on which this classy city, showcasing some of the world's best art and architecture, comes up trumps over the Big Apple

Chicago baffles me. As a city it has everything lively going for it - from boasting one of the best Impressionistic art museums in the world to ranking as the cradle of stand-up comedy that has birthed the likes of Mike Meyers. Yet, it continues to stoically endure the general impression that it can't hold a candle to New York.

Living here for two years now, I promptly picked up on Chicago's Big Apple complex. Which is nonsense, because it's far superior, in all the ways that count, anyway. Chicago is a cornucopia of gardens, as opposed to the concrete jungle New York has planted. It has litter-free streets, instead of open sewers and garbage dumps out there. The architecture of the city is diverse and innovative - in contrast, to let me see…

Once a largely agrarian city, known for its cornfields, farmers and other hearty meat and potato-eating occupants, Chicago hasn't quite awoken to its own present-day charm. Easily the prettiest city in the US (although Californians will go blue in the face declaring otherwise), Chicago shrugged off its mantle as the world's crime capital a while ago. Especially in summer, the city comes alive after its long spell of wintry hibernation. Every year the suicide rate shoots up between December and February, causing the government to hang strings of fairy lights on barren trees in a desperate bid to spread cheer in an otherwise morose world. Winter, which has resulted in Chicago's baptism as 'The Windy City', leaves Chicagoans with a Zen-like belief that if the season doesn't kill you with frostbite, it will only make you stronger.

Here you'll never find crabby cabbies scornfully tossing back what they perceive as a lousy tip, saying, "You keep it, you look like you need it." But you will find the best jazz and blues belted out in the tiniest bars that have inspired the likes of Aretha Franklin and Muddy Waters. Rhythm and blues originated from the sociological and industrial changes that took place in the US during World War II. Foremost among these was a widespread shift in American demographics. Attracted by relatively high-paying wartime employment, hundreds of thousands of black Americans migrated from the rural South to Midwest, Northeast and West Coast cities. New styles were created to meet the changing tastes of this demographic group, leading to the development of the urbane sounds of R&B. So from chi-chi bars like Buddy Guy's, which attracts the best local bands and big-name acts, to the family-run Rosa's Lounge, which is frequented by true blues fans, Chicago is the raison d'etre for soul and blues lovers.

Alas, disgruntled Chicagoans often say that the city isn't as fast-paced as New York. But this is true. You won't find New York's hardcore bustle, manically paced lifestyle, cut-throat competitiveness and matchbox apartments here. Instead, Chicago has an old-world charm that comfortably nestles with its modernity. It has quaint neighbourhoods time seems to have bypassed. The character of these vintage localities is fiercely protected by the city's zoning laws, which won't even allow a Benetton store on their exclusively boutique-lined streets. Gone are the days when Chicago's neighbourhoods were associated with Al Capone's rowdy 'gangsta paradise'. Richard Daley, the city mayor, has incorporated his own brand of gangsterism. One of the most colourful political figures in the US, Daley considers himself above the law. And he is. After all, for him, running the city is a family business. His father (also Richard Daley), the mayor before him for 21 years, is best remembered as being the last 'Big Boss' of Chicago. Daley Junior has spent years ridding the city of its crime and beautifying it, pouring millions of dollars into tree planting along the Michigan Avenue lakefront. He has enlivened the city by introducing street festivals that showcase art and food from across the planet. The Art Festival in Old Town blocks off a whole street for a new generation of artists, sculptors and lithographers to pitch tent on.

Daley's last project, the controversial $4.3-billion Millennium Park, has been completed four years after the millennium at three times over-budget. The park itself has been the crowning jewel in Chicago's lauded architectural tiara. Its pièce de résistance is the sculpture by Mumbai-born, London-based and internationally acclaimed architect, Anish Kapoor, hailed as typifying the new generation of British sculptors who have set a precedent for a modernist doctrine. His mammoth bean-shaped creation baptised 'Cloud Gate' - which Chicagoans with a singular lack of imagination call 'The Bean' - is a tribute to this city's past and future. It sits regally, all 110 tons of it, at the park entrance. You fully experience the majestic nature of the work by walking through and around it. Inspired by liquid mercury, the sculpture is among the largest in the world, measuring 66 feet in length by 33 feet in height. Kapoor believes it reflects his spirituality, the philistines insist it reflects the skyline. The simple fact is that The Bean captures the essence of Chicago - essentially modern, yet reflecting the buildings of old Chicago's history.

The Park's other attraction is the Jay Pritzker Pavilion, designed by architect, Frank Gehry. This auditorium and seating area are designed to create a sense of almost enclosed space, a virtual indoor theatre for 4,000 listeners sitting in the pavilion's fixed seats and the lawn crowd of up to 7,000. The open-air auditorium is so high-tech, even the soil has been treated to absorb rainwater within 25 seconds of it hitting the ground. The acoustic team has solved some of the complex problems of presenting classical music outdoors that the word's best sound designers have long grappled with.

With claims to fame as prolific and varied as these, I've quit trying to understand Chicago's New York hangover. I recently asked a red-blooded Chicagoan about the city's chip on its shoulder. This is how the conversation went…

Red-blooded Chicagoan: 'I love my city, but it's not New York.'

Just-off-the-boat Chicagoan: 'Yes, but why do you say that? Have you ever been there?'

RBC: 'No, can't say I have.'

JOBC: 'Why not?'

RBC: 'I've never felt the need.'

I couldn't sum it up more succinctly myself.