Arabic signs appear in Polish resort town amid surge in tourists from Middle East

Signs in Arabic, created with the help of artificial intelligence, have appeared around the Polish mountain resort town of Zakopane as local businesses prepare for a record number of tourists from the Middle East this year.

Zakopane, which sits at the foot of Poland’s southern Tatra mountains, has in recent years become a popular destination for Arab visitors. A record number came last year, when they made up the largest group of foreign tourists, reports the Gazeta Wyborcza daily. And this year bookings are even higher.

“We have around 20% more reservations from this direction [the Middle East] than in the same period last year,” Karol Wagner of the Tatra Chamber of Commerce told the newspaper last month. It is estimated that around 15% of tourists in the area now come from Arab countries.

Górale z Zakopanego przeżywają kolejny najazd turystów. Dlaczego Arabowie interesują się Polską po sezonie? #Wyborcza #Zakopane https://t.co/M0pbFSV9WX

— Gazeta Wyborcza.pl (@gazeta_wyborcza) September 11, 2023

In anticipation of the arrival of visitors from places such as Bahrain, UAE and Qatar – who are bigger spenders on average than Polish or other European tourists – local businesses have been preparing material in Arabic.

Signs have appeared around the city advertising restaurants in Arabic, including the fact that they offer halal food. (Poland is in fact one of Europe’s biggest producers of halal and kosher meat.)

“This is a consequence of the innate skill of Podhale entrepreneurs combined with the most modern AI solutions,” Wagner told Gazeta Wyborcza, referring to the name of the historical Podhale region in which Zakopane is located.

“Thanks to tools that enable error-free communication in Arabic, we can create ads, menus and information in Arabic quickly and completely free of charge,” he added.

Arabowie szturmują Zakopane. Oto co kupują https://t.co/8Kj8q6TdCM pic.twitter.com/zPY8etjQgG

— Money.pl (@Money_pl) August 3, 2023

The head of Zakopane county council, Agata Wojtowicz, told the newspaper that there was initially “a little indignation” among locals when the first Arab tourists began to arrive in the town. “Everyone is first afraid of something they don’t know.”

In 2019, a local newspaper warned Poles “not to panic” at the fact that some Arab tourists were giving local children money. This was just part of a present-giving tradition during Ramadan, it informed.

Now, says Wojtowicz, the visitors are welcomed. “These billboards [in Arabic] are another step in our flexibility,” she added.

Last year, Emilia Glista, from a local consulting and marketing agency, noted that tourists from the Middle East have helped Zakopane “fill the gap left by guests from Belarus and Russia, whom we no longer see here” following the invasion of Ukraine.

Arab tourists in the mountain resort of Zakopane have been giving local Polish children money as they celebrate the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha with its tradition of gift-giving.

The Tatra mountains are a popular destination for Arab visitors to Poland https://t.co/9WfURZaJoZ

— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) August 14, 2019

Meanwhile, Polish media report that Arab visitors are also becoming interested in another popular Polish tourist destination: the northern Baltic coast.

“The proportion of foreign guests is higher [than before] in Świnoujście,” Agnieszka Maszner-Paprocka of the Polish Hotel Industry Chamber of Commerce told news website Wirtualna Polska last month, referring to a popular tourist town.

“They are mainly tourists from Germany, but we are also an attractive destination for Swedes and Czechs. There are also the first inquiries from Saudi Arabian citizens,” she added.

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Main image credit: Marek Podmokly / Agencja Wyborcza.pl

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.