There's this little shopping center, possibly you have heard of it? Mall of America. Northwest Airlines regularly flies full charters from all over the world. They arrive in Minneapolis Friday evening and leave Sunday morning. Time in between is taken up with one activity. SHOPPING!! Literally the hotel is in the mall, the restaurants are in the mall and of course the shops are in the mall.

Now I like to shop, but OMG - face a 10 hour flight just so you can shop? I think I'll pass.

I would guess the people who do this, do so much shopping in such a short period at such a great savings compared to their home countries, that it makes sense.

Or who knows, maybe it's just a leisure pastime for many, but I could see it paying off. For example, you have a large extended family and friend network, and buy a year's worth of shower, wedding, and baby gifts, plus a year's worth of clothes and toiletries for your family. Prices for certain basic items can be very high in some places.

Maybe it's not that different from people stuck in a very small town who make a ten-hour drive to Walmart every few months?

My SIL says mostly it's electronics and as you mentioned basics. They will come back loaded down with a new camera, DVD player, laptop and a suitcase full of toiletries.

I hadn't thought of it that way but we used to drive hours and hours one way to Minneapolis (the big city) when I was growing up.

When I was young, I use to fly with TWA and we would sometimes fly to London or Paris for the weekend just to shop.

At that time, the things we were buying were cheaper there than in NYC and of course it cost us nothing to fly.( We were not senior enough to have those good routes to buy on our lay overs).

Argentina is still an incredible bargain.