Queues

3 February 2011

In South Africa, they say plate instead of burner, robot instead of traffic light, and module instead of course. In South Africa, they have queues instead of lines. In the United States (or as they say, “on that side”), I have often found myself waiting in line behind several other customers. In these situations, I know how many people are ahead of me, and I know the average rate at which these people are moving, so I can calculate the approximate time remaining until I will arrive at the front of the line and accomplish my planned business. Sometimes I determine that the required time is not worth the benefit, but even at the BMV, these waiting times are finite.

In a queue, there is no such calculating. You may wait in a queue for ages, and then learn that the service you’re after is not available until Monday. You may wait in the same queue four separate times to get a form, then another form, then a key, then a card. You may wait in an unmoving queue for the staff’s entire lunch break. You may wait in a queue for no clear purpose and when you’ve finished, still not know what the stamp on your form accomplished. You may wait in a seemingly sensible queue, only to find when you reach the front that you should’ve weighed your cheese, and then dash to another queue at the weighing station only to find that your cheese can’t be weighed after 5pm. At this point, you must give up on the cheese entirely and dash back to the original queue to finish your transaction so you don’t become the cause of an eternal queue. You may wait in a single queue at the post office that feeds into six counters, all with complicated labels that have absolutely nothing to do with purchasing stamps. On the other hand, you may wait in a queue that (based on your previous experiences) is likely to last all day for just a few minutes before a phone call or a man in uniform informs you that international students don’t have to wait in the queue at all but can leap ahead to a different much shorter process.

The amazing thing is, this system somehow works. South Africans mail their letters and buy their food, if not the barcode-lacking cheese. College students manage to get into their rooms, register for their modules, and activate their ID cards. I guess while I’m here, I’ll wait in queues and it’ll work for me too. But I think I’ll bring a book when I go to get my ID activated.