Not SCUBA, but travel and importation related.
Billy and I went skiing in Austria, and each day the ground operator would come to our hotel and sell us various transportation options for choices of different ski areas. They had an array of college age girls who spoke whatever languages needed to service the visiting skiers. Billy meets this Russian girl and is instantly smitten with Svetlana, a stunning creature of classical features, education and culture and brains. We return to the US, but Billy kept in contact with her. Lots of contact... $1,ooo phone bills. Trips to meet her at the Rooskie version of our Caribbean. Visiting her in Rooshia. Say $25,ooo worth of long distance dating in total.
Yadda Yadda Yadda, now we are off to Moscow to get Billy married to Svetlana. Aeroflot airfares times the 5 of us, rooms at the hotel next to the Lubianka KGB Prison, tix to the Bolshoi, food and beverage and all of that, maybe another $20,ooo... Hard to say what with the highly variable flim-flammerry exchange rate. Maybe another $3,ooo to get married all legal and paperwork including the Zil limousine with sirens and lights (grampa was a decorated Komissar) and celebration dinner (where they put me next to a former KGB agent that I likely tried to kill in Grenada but it's all good now, vodka comrade mujik!)
Moscow for two weeks in this situation was truly one of the most interesting experiences I've ever had. This place was pure Jabberwocky, through the looking glass type insanity. Everything you know is wrong. Nukkin' futz, Boris.
We go back to the States. A few months later, they get Svetlana all crated-up and shipped to O'hare to get her big welcome.
She didn't like it here. Decried the lack of culture. She wanted no more, and went home 4 months later. Add another $10,ooo for the RMA (return merchandise authorization number), airfare, the paperwork for divorce, cost of shipping her clothes back (which we stuffed the extra space with some American toilet paper as a parting gift).
Yes, when shopping abroad (or for one), do be cautious of the hidden costs.
(If you want to do this as a SCUBA Diver, try the Philippines. It's been a noted phenomenon)