Purchasing is not so cool anymore

22 Sep 2025

Almost two years ago I moved to Uruguay with my family. This is not so big country with about 3.5 mln people, between Argentina and Brazil. You can read a lot about Uruguay something like it has very high democracy level, and very low corruption; or there are 4 times more cows than people; or that it is a Latin American Switzerland… everything is true, but for me, as for European, it was a surprise how small the market of the goods I’m used to, and how high the prices. The world knows brands of electronics are expensive and the variety is not so great, prices in supermarkets are surprisingly high, the cars are expensive, the houses are expensive, comparing to their quality…

For the first time I tried not to think a lot about it, and after one year of living I found myself looking at all of that different way. For example, if you really need a car, buy it with the budget you have, even if in other countries you could afford much better option for the same price. It’s just a car. The same for electronics - you need it? Buy what you can afford. The house? Do you really need so big house? Maybe not?

I started to think of the goods not so much as before. These are just the things. It’s much more valuable to walk to the ocean and see a sunset. Purchasing is not so cool anymore.