School vacation good for Palestinian economy

Gaza For many Gazans, summer is considered the best time of the year not only because it’s the season for vacations and having a good time but also the best time of the year for many businesses catering to the vacationers.

In summer, many of the internal activities take place in the besieged coastal area which tends to revive the weak economy of the Strip.

Thousands of families go to beaches almost every day to hang around with families after purchasing their trip’s needs.

Those who can affort rent tents or sit in a café on the beach which provides them with all means of services and refreshments.

Abd Al Hamid Shammalak, an owner of a beach camp said: “It’s the best time of year for us or in other words this is the only time in the year we actually work because the students are off which encourage their families to come and spend the time at our cafe.

Abd Al Hamid added: “We work day and night to cover the loss which we incur during winter when nobody comes to our cafeteria.

Ali Abu Shahla, an economist said: “The amount that the families spend in summer are bigger than the amounts they spend in the winter since their children are on vacation and they try involving them in many trips or activities.

Abu Shahla added: “Not only the entertainment field is rejuvenated during the summer but also other fields such as services sectors as children have a lot of spare time on their hands so their parents try to involve them in good activities such as studying new languages or learning computer skills.

Many centers provide multi-languages and computer skills to encourage parents to get their children to participate in these courses.

Hatem Shurab, an owner of a Multilanguage and computer skills center said: “We have noticed that the numbers of the attendees for the English and computer courses are three times bigger than those participating at any other time of the year which makes us hire more people and work twice as long.”

Since most of the Palestinians are educated, they try to fill their spare time with activities which might be useful and might open other opportunities for them in the future.

But these courses and activities might be considered extra burden on the family especially if the parents (which is usually happens) have more than one child and have to attend more than one child into such courses.

Neven Saqar, a mother of three children participating in an English learning course said: “I encouraged my three children to participate in an Multilanguage center to learn English language since I believe it will benefit them in the future.” she added, “If I hadn’t saved up during the last three months, it would have affected the house hold expenses”