Earlier this summer I was walking down West End Avenue in Manhattan and remembered, with a sadness that nearly knocked me off my feet, just why I came to New York seven years ago and just why I am now about to leave. Certain kinds of buildin...

The only sour note that day was that her mother, whom Eva called Agi(from Agnes), was not around to help celebrate. She was in Budapest about to have minor surgery. Still, Eva felt her mother could “have managed to come.”...