You must be thinking of OxyContin. Ambien has a low abuse potential. I've never heard of anyone crushing Ambien tablets to be snorted or injected. In the US, Ambien is a schedule IV controlled substance (low abuse potential and less restricted distribution restrictions) whereas OxyContin is a schedule II controlled substance with a high abuse potential and strict distribution restrictions.

No, I can assure you that Zolpidem is definitely being abused ... the plastic coating on Sanofi-Aventis Ambien was to hinder insufflation ...

I have a bottle of Ambien - brand name - that does not have a plastic coating and have not noticed a plastic coating on any Ambien Rx. I get the 10 mg but often split the pills in half.

We usually stock up on antibiotics in Buenos Aires. The cost of the doctor visit co-pay plus Rx co-pay for sinus infections that I get at least twice a year is more than the cost of the Rx without insurance. I use z-pack - generic name azithromycin. My normal dosage is 250 mg - but in Argentina, they always want to sell me the 500 mg. I now tell the pharmacist that it is for a child and they will give me the 250 mg.

I am going to have to disagree with you here. I just came back from Buenos Aires and rented an apartment through bytargentina. The experience from beginning to end was wonderful! The apartment was exactly as described and shown in the pictures. The representatives I had contact with both by email and in person could not have been more helpful. And I got my entire deposit back with no problems at all. I was even allowed to stay in the apartment a little longer as I wasn't quite ready to leave. The owner's representative just had me drop the keys in the mailbox as I left.

I know several others in our group used them for rentals and I don't know of any that had anything negative to say. One of our group has used them for several years ... never a problem.

I'll go ahead and presume you mean me Tazi. I wouldnt say never a problem. I was disappointed in last year's apartment but as you know it was my 3rd year paying the same price so inflation was in karma compared to price.

We had construction above ours this year which was severely annoying, but was no fault of ByT.

I can say I've always gotten all my deposit back and never had problems of a serious nature.

Bottom line, if you like a service better, go with it. But for me over 4 occasions and now having been in at least 3 other apartments rented from them this year besides my own I would say you get what you pay for but all of them are as advertised.

Does anyone have a recommendation of a good neighborhood that I should be looking at when considering one of the weekly apartment rentals (or any specific apartment recomendations). I have a 5 night award stay booked at the Sheraton Liberator for Oct 11th - Oct 16th (but will be in Argentina from the 11th - 20th, so am considering canceling my reservations and saving the points for another time if I can get a good deal on an apartment rental.

I'll be with my wife so we just want to be close to the main shopping and dining areas and have easy access to public transportation, but want to make sure it's in a safe area. I also speak very little spanish so I am not sure if that will make it harder to arrange the short-term apartment rental or not.

Thanks for any suggestions/tips!

The 2 main areas for tourist rentals seem to be Palermo (newer, tends to be a bit more upscale) and San Telmo (historic, many old buildings, some decrepit, many restored). They are on opposite sides of "the main shopping and dining areas" but both have plenty of their own shopping and dining. Both are also Subte-convenient, and taxis are cheap and plentiful. (Your current hotel is somewhat between the two.) San Telmo is much closer to Puerto Madero, if that interests you at all. Sunday in San Telmo is a big street fair with hundreds of vendors selling everything from crapola to things you might really want to buy.

I'm not too familiar with Palermo, but I think you'd be satisfied in either place. In May, I spent a week in an apartment in San Telmo, which I preferred a whole lot more than staying at the Libertador last month (and I have no real complaints about the hotel at all). (The place I stayed is currently rented out, so I can't recommend it to you.)

I would add Recoleta as the third main area for rentals. Puerto Madero is a potential fourth area, although its still very new and is kind of an area in itself... great if you want to have very new & modern apartments, but sort of lacking in character and tradition when compared to the other three (Palermo, Recoleta and San Telmo).

Thanks for the info Gaucho100k and Eastbay1k, I will look into these areas and see what I can find. Do you know if it's possible to negotiate prices down at all. Seeing as how I am looking for something from Oct 11th - 18th if a place is not currently rented out and it's less than 2 weeks away I'd think they would want to at least make some money on the apartment rather than let it set empty (sort of the priceline aproach :) ).

Eastbay1k - If you don't mind me asking how much did you pay for the place you rented? In my limited searching I have found places ranging from 250 - 600+ and just wanted a figure to baseline the prices I am seeing against.

$0 :) It is my cousin's place. But I think that the rental is about $400/wk.

That doesn't seem to happen. Many of the properties you can book online are owned by non-Argentines and are rented through a management company. The company usually takes a fixed percentage of the rent.

John

Wirelessly posted (Palm TX: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 98; PalmSource/Palm-D050; Blazer/4.3) 16;320x320)

I agree it will be tough to negotiate down the prices, but its worth a try....

Going to be tough for a one week rental. The only luck friends have had is when it was for a longer term and they were willing to pay the full amount up front. But yes, if rentals have been slow they may be willing to take a bit less, but would not expect more than a 10% reduction.

Sam

Well I've found two possible apartment rentals. One is located in the Palermo - park district and on the corner of Bulnes and Las Heras. The other one is at 3296 Ugarteche in the Palermo district. Anyone have any idea if these locations are bad or have other issues with them? Also does anyone have experience with argentinaconsultant.com?

Sorry to be such a pain with all of the questions!

If you will go with Bulnes and Las Heras, make sure its a high floor..... the area is prone to high levels of noise due to traffic. Whats the cross street of the Ugarteche pad?