Jan 24, 2007
Revolting Queue
The area of London where I live is pretty much the only place in this city where I still see people queueing for the bus. To be honest, that’s one of the reasons I like living there. I want to live somewhere where people are courteous and considerate. In fact, I want to live in 1930s small-town England, but that’s another story.
The other morning, I witnessed near anarchy on the rivertide-lapped streets of south-west London, as the beautiful natural orderliness of things was disturbed by the actions of An Outsider.
Burn him! Burn him!
When I got to the bus stop, there were four people waiting there already, so I joined the end of the line. Number five. The queueing system is always the same – people stand in single file along the slim pavement, snaking away from the bus stop, and facing the oncoming traffic. As more people show up, the line gets longer and longer, because that’s what lines do, and that’s what we nice people of Britain do, we queue, and by God it is sacred to us, so do not mess.
By the time fifteen minutes had passed, there was no bus – probably as a result of crap traffic and weather combined – and 23 people in the queue. We stood. We shifted. We peered hopefully at the bend in the road. We checked our watches. Nothing. No bus.
And then, sauntering up the road, his black and white stripy hat pulled low over his brow, a slight man approached the head of the queue. He studied the timetable for a nanosecond, and then stepped back and stopped, leaning against the wall, his hands thrust deep in winter pockets.
A quiet murmur of snorts and derisory grunts emitted involuntarily from the queue. Rhubarb rhubarb. Who’s this? What’s he doing? Doesn’t he know there’s a queue? Is he? He can’t be, can he? These are the rules. This is what we do. Doesn’t he know? Can’t he see? Doesn’t he CARE? Incredible! Inconceivable!
The linemembers glanced at each other in silent and growing disgust and incredulity. The audacity! The sheer affrontery! The gall!
Who will say something? The people at the back craned out of the line towards those at the front, urging them into action with eyebrows and glares, silently. The people at the front twirled their necks around towards those in the middle and the back, who’d have the most to lose from someone pushing in.
Not a word was spoken. The whole line had become electric with unspoken urgency, but still no-one said a thing.
Then suddenly, in the distance, the red hulk of the bus hove into view.
Muscles tightened along the line, and it was clear that individuals were plotting how to ensure that this…this IMPOSTER, this INTERLOPER didn’t succeed in jumping the queue: Oh, you can wait at the front, sonny-Jim, but you’re not going to get on before me, you mark my words. Shoulders and elbows and briefcases were aligned and primed in readiness for the Barnes-Barge-and-Body-Block: a prim and oh-so-polite manoevre which efficiently prevents access to the offending party by inserting one’s own body – and associated accessories – in their path. Often seen employed at the bar in the Sun Inn by rugby types.
But – oh, the humanity – when the doors opened, young stripy hatted man nimbly hopped on before anyone could blink or barge, and tripped lightly to the back seat, where he endured, unaware, the wrath of two dozen pissed-off commuters glaring at him as they boarded.
And so the journey passed. We commuters, stuffed into the bus like sand between the toes of a big red giant, steaming quietly, rolled eyes at each other as we rolled over the bridge towards work.
Meanwhile, in the row behind me, the urgent schtomp schtomp schtomp of the skinny guy’s music through tinny earbuds sounded like the jangling of so many keys.
I encounter so many situations like this in everyday life and I am proud to say that…ah, who am I kidding? I just seethe silently as well. And play different scenarios over and over in my mind were I do something. The last scenario always ends in me getting stabbed for my troubles so I think I will stick to my tightlipped, closemouthed policy for now…
I’ve got friends who do say things. I love them for this. I would quite happily pay someone to follow me around and tell people off when these events happen.
I only occasionally manage to do so, and when I do, I am so uncomfortable about it I don’t really see it as much of a victory.
I share Genes thoughts on worried about getting physically assaulted for saying something. Although this might be more my feelings than anything else.
I got a book for Christmas called Watching the English by Kate Fox which talks at length about this kind of thing. It’s funny though; she says the same kind of thing about people queueing ‘properly’ as English people understand it, but up here in Newcastle people don’t. Queue properly. A queue forms inside our bus shelter, in that most people get onto the bus in the order they arrived at the bus stop even though we don’t stand in order. But although it’s blatantly obvious to most of us that the queue goes backwards along the path, some people insist on queuing the other way. They board the bus at roughly the right time, but not exactly. And it winds me up, every time it happens.
Why does it matter, really? Why do we get so upset about it? It’s strange. We English are not right in the head.
omg I’d have burst!
This reminds me of departure lounges, on unallocated flights, the atmosphere is like 1 second before the olympic 100m. I hate airports, on every flight I guarentee I will see a fight, or dispute of one form or another.