I was standing in
line at the McDonald’s in Mumbai’s Vashi one day last week. I stood at one of
the counters, behind a woman who was being served, and waited. A minute later,
two young ladies came in. As I watched, they casually came and stood in line –
in front of me. When I politely but firmly pointed out that I was in line, they
first seemed surprised that I would have the bad manners to bring this up.
Then, seeing the smoke emanating from my ears, they quickly apologized and went
to stand at the back.
Ref:
Prakash Singh/ Agence France-Presse/ Getty Images
We live in a hugely-populated, resource-constrained country.
As a result of that, two things may be happening. One is that we’ve stood in so
many queues during our lives, we’re tired of standing in queues and we just
don’t want to do it anymore. The other is that we’ve seen that if we wait
patiently in a queue, by the time our turn comes up, the item is sold out or “it’s
break time”. Have you heard the saying, “Good things come to those who wait”?
Not here, you haven’t. In this environment, he who hesitates is lost for sure.
With 1.2 billion people eyeing the same McAloo Tikki, we can’t afford to stand
in line.
It could also be because our society is very hierarchical.
We intrinsically believe in inequality. Someone may have hallucinations of a
flat world but ours is vertical – based on money, influence, education, caste,
skin color, and the list goes on. We’ve all had the experience of waiting in a
long line and seeing someone ushered through before us; no doubt a friend of
the DM, GM, or PM. “First come, first served” has little meaning here. It’s
more like “VIP come, VIP served.” If I’m more important than you, why should I
stand in line behind you? My time is more precious and my needs more valid.
Surely I deserve it faster, and more of it too.
But what happens to those of us who are not VIPs, or even
IPs? Maybe we are just Ps. Then the trick is to pretend we’re more important
than the other guys. Some clever man rightly said “If you can’t dazzle them
with brilliance, baffle them with bull****.” If you look important, you may get
away with jumping the queue – most of the time.
A story I recently heard captures this well. In a busy
airport, an airline check-in agent was trying to help a long queue of
passengers. An important-looking man marched straight up to the counter and
demanded to be served immediately because he had a flight to catch. The agent
politely told him that all the people in line were waiting for the same flight
so if he’d kindly stand in the queue, she’d be happy to help him. Angry, he
asked her, “Do you know who I am?!” The agent looked at him, then switched on
the intercom and made an announcement: “I have a gentleman here at the counter
who does not know who he is. Could
someone please help him?” This received roars of laughter from the passengers
waiting in line. The man was furious and said to the agent through clenched
teeth: “F*** you!” She sweetly replied, “You’ll have to stand in line for that,
too.”
Let’s face it: In India, jumping the queue can indeed be a
useful survival skill. However, as India’s population continues to grow and
resources become even more scarce, our ability to stand in a queue to await our
turn – whether on foot waiting for water, in a store waiting for service, or in
a car waiting for the green light –will not just grease the wheels of social
interaction, it will allow products and services and traffic to flow more
efficiently.
It could also prevent queue rage, road rage, and
one day, perhaps, even riots in the street. But we’ll only consider standing in
line if we see that there is some value in it. We need to see VIPs doing it,
consistently and proudly, and taking only what is their due at their turn. And
we need to see that by doing it ourselves, we’ll receive our due at our turn –
whether that’s a place in school, a job, a hospital bed, a railway ticket, or a
burger.
