No food?
Not the same Buenos Aires that I live in part time.
I get fat.
I eat all kinds of fruits and vegetables, I buy yogurt from the middle eastern shops on Scalabrini, along with lots of other middle eastern stuff.
Its true, there is no Marmite, or cottage Cheese, or Captain Crunch cereal or Dr. Pepper.
but in pretty much every food group, there are all kinds of choices, and there is more and more organic, local, and gourmet food all the time.
I go to the farmers markets, to the big old fashioned mercados, to El Galpon, and I find a lot of really good stuff to eat.
I must admit, I do like fresh pasta, things like salmon and basil raviolis, and I do like pizza- but I make lots of salads, fresh fruit smoothies, cook vegetables, and make thai and indian and mexican dishes all the time. You can certainly adapt the available ingredients to many different dishes.
I also wonder about the clothes thing that comes up so often.
If all you wear in the USA is the cheapest, made in China crap from Walmart, then, yes, argentine clothes are more expensive. But I dont. I have found, and bought, reasonably priced Argentine mens designer clothes, great shoes very reasonably priced, mens work clothes, quality cotton undershirts, and much more. Its not as cheap as walmart, but its much cheaper than higher end stuff is in the USA.
I have a pair of handmade leather low boots, I bought them in Buenos Aires from Correa for about what a midrange pair of Nike Air Jordans cost in Seattle . I would say they are competitive in quality with John Lobb, in London, which starts at about $2800 for their off the rack shoes, well over $3500 for their custom ones.
I have found similar deals on things like leather coats, or really any leather goods- as in, dirt cheap by international standards.
I would absolutely agree- bring electronics. bring spare power cords for your mac laptops- 20 bucks on ebay in the usa, unobtainium in BsAs.
Bring extra camera batteries, extra chargers, extra cords and bring blank CD-Rs if you use em- all those kinds of things are expensive here.
Anything Apple is stratospheric in price.
Bring good liquor- buy duty free on your way in- any imported liquor is very expensive.
But mostly, beyond electronics, just learn to go native.
Eat local, buy local.