Following-up my last post about cheating little and paying big…when I was in Budapest in 1996, I rode the Metro there a LOT. A British guy I had met earlier in Prague told me that you could ride all you wanted without paying—they only did spot checks and nobody ever got caught. Being a student, I immediately elected this “don’t pay” method of payment upon my arrival.

Well, sure enough I got caught, and I had to pay. Funny thing is, Metro tickets were only around 80 Florints then (I think), which is about 32 cents. My fine was 3,000 Florints, or around $12, or nearly 38 times the cost of a ticket! Anyway, this is what Martha’s going through right now. Penalties must be steep or they won’t discourage anything. Be sure your sins will find you out, cha-ching.