Swarm

You may have heard me say this a few times, but one of the things I love about Budapest is the weather. Saturday was one of those almost perfect days: Highs in the low 80's and windy (I say almost perfect because it was too sunny. For a day to be really perfect it should also be overcast without actually raining, but I digress). Perfect weather to open all the windows in the house and just enjoy the coolness. Only one problem: No Screens. I have not seen a screen window or screen door since we moved to Europe. Saturday evening was spent killing all the bugs (mostly Big-Ass mosquitoes) that had flew in the house. Anna and I must have killed at least 20 of them, no exaggeration, in the living room alone.

I did some research and from what I can tell the reason there are no screens in Hungary is a sad one. Apparently when the Soviets took over one of the first things they did was to take all of the screens and send them back to Moscow. Throughout the years of Communist rule, the populace tried many alternatives to keeping out the bugs, the most famous failure, the "Iron Curtain Experiment", you may have heard of. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the country had lost all of it's screen making technology and remain to proud to ask for foreign aid.

True Story.