Every summer, as the North Coast fills with vacationers, social media, in turn, fills with images of mockery and criticism.
People’s spending becomes a subject of condemnation, while their parties, clothes, restaurants, and cars are transformed into evidence that they are disconnected from society—as though happiness were a crime, going on vacation were a sin, and spending money were, in itself, an act requiring an apology.
I do not deny that the North Coast sometimes displays excess. Nor do I deny that the disparity in incomes in Egypt is a painful reality that deserves to be confronted. And I certainly do not deny that some prices and behaviors may cross the boundaries of good taste.
But the question that occupies my mind is: Why do we see only one side of the picture? Why are we so good at identifying what we object to, yet so incapable of seeing what deserves appreciation?
I learned from the founders and management of the beautiful Almaza Bay village, where I spend several weeks with my family, that the number of people employed there, directly and indirectly, reaches approximately 4,000 employees and workers.
If the North Coast contains more than 150 villages and tourist resorts, which naturally vary in their size, scale of activity, and number of employees, then we are looking at a huge sector that may provide hundreds of thousands of jobs during the season.
The figure could potentially reach, according to a preliminary estimate that certainly requires a precise official study, nearly half a million direct and indirect jobs.
Behind every worker is a family waiting for his income, children who depend on him, and a household whose ability to cope with the cost of living improves.
We are not talking only about the people employed inside the resorts. We are talking about an entire economic ecosystem: construction and maintenance workers; electrical and water engineers; security and cleaning staff; chefs and waiters; gardeners and drivers; sailors and lifeguards; hotel, restaurant, and retail workers; suppliers of food, beverages, furniture, and furnishings; transportation, telecommunications, and entertainment companies; and hundreds of occupations and services that never appear in the photographs posted on social media.
Behind every table in a restaurant are Egyptian hands at work.
Behind every house being maintained is a skilled worker earning a wage.
Behind every musical performance are workers, technicians, engineers, and young people organizing, guarding, transporting, and lighting the venue.
And behind every pound spent by a vacationer is a chain of income reaching people who may never travel to the North Coast for recreation, but who benefit economically from its existence.
Therefore, talk of millions of visits to the North Coast during the summer months should not be viewed merely as a gathering of wealthy people looking for pleasure. It should be understood as a broad economic movement.
If approximately six to eight million trips and visits take place in this region during the season, these people are not consuming sand and sea. They are buying goods, requesting services, creating demand—and demand employs people and drives production.
Not to mention Arab and foreign tourism, the hard currency that is spent, and the economic activity whose benefits spread throughout society.
Someone may say that these are seasonal jobs, and that is partly true.
But seasonal employment is better than permanent unemployment, and the income a worker earns during the summer may help support his family for many months afterward.
The objective should not be to condemn the season, but to think about how to extend it, improve the skills of those working in it, and transform the North Coast from a destination that operates for only three or four months a year into a tourist and economic region that operates throughout most of the year.
Why shouldn’t activity extend into spring and autumn?
Why shouldn’t the region host conferences, exhibitions, sporting events, and artistic and cultural festivals throughout the year?
Why shouldn’t we develop vocational training, improve service quality, establish a better public transportation system, and increase the number of hotels capable of receiving international tourists instead of relying primarily on seasonal real-estate ownership?
These are the questions that build. Mockery creates not a single job.
And then, what is wrong with people being happy?
Has it become necessary for a person to hide his happiness out of respect for the suffering of others?
Is the solution to poverty for those who can afford to spend money to stop spending, or is it to direct their spending into the national economy, so that money circulates and creates jobs, income, taxes, and investment?
Social justice does not mean universalizing deprivation.
Equality is not achieved by turning off the lights of illuminated homes, but by bringing electricity to homes that remain in darkness.
The solution is not for everyone to be sad. It is to make opportunities for happiness, work, and a dignified life available to greater numbers of people.
What should be criticized is not happiness, but exclusion.
Not spending, but corruption, harmful extravagance, or evasion of social responsibility.
Not the success of tourist resorts, but the absence of planning that connects their success to the development of the communities surrounding them.
We have the right to demand that the benefits of the North Coast extend to neighboring villages and cities—in the form of roads, schools, hospitals, training, and decent employment opportunities.
We have the right to demand good public beaches, because the sea is not a class privilege.
We have the right to ask about environmental protection, the rational use of water and energy, price controls, the preservation of workers’ dignity, and their social and health security.
But demanding these rights is fundamentally different from condemning the entire North Coast or portraying everyone who goes there as an obnoxious person disconnected from their country.
Societies do not progress by hating successful people or mocking happy ones. They progress by transforming individual and institutional success into a broader economic and social value.
If the North Coast has succeeded in attracting millions of visits, employing hundreds of thousands of people, and creating an economic season that people look forward to every year, then this is an achievement that deserves to be studied and developed—not morally torn down.
I suggest that the state, in cooperation with the owners of villages and tourist establishments, conduct a genuine survey of the number of direct and indirect jobs generated by the North Coast, the volume of wages, purchases, and taxes, the proportion of workers coming from other governorates, and the number of families that depend on this sector.
Such a survey would reveal that the picture is far broader than a noisy party or an expensive restaurant.
Let people be happy. Let them spend, as long as their spending is legitimate. And let Egypt’s young people work, earn, and gain experience.
Then let us use reason to expand the circle of beneficiaries, rather than using anger to destroy what has already been achieved.
The goal should not be to close down the North Coast because the poor cannot afford to go there. The goal should be to build an economy that enables a greater number of Egyptians to enjoy the sea of their own country.
Joy is not a betrayal of society. Work is not a luxury. And success is not a crime.
A more just society is not one that prevents those who are better off from enjoying themselves, but one that…
