Queues around the World

Forget all that business about flags and anthems and agonising about national characteristics—perhaps the way people queue is a much better indicator of national identity. So for what it’s worth, here’s a quick trip around the world, according to queue protocol.

In Britain, people queue politely, obediently. You always know where a queue is—it stretches, often seemingly ad infinitum, neatly packed. People might enter the queue with a general smile, a polite nod to the situation, but otherwise give the general impression of being there in body, but not in spirit. In a country where close proximity is seen as vaguely threatening, another national characteristic comes into play to ensure a queue is a successful one—the British desire for national cohesion and conformity. This means that people rarely jump queues—and those who do tend to need very thick skins to weather the freezing-out which then occurs.

In France, people queue only because they have to. Everybody tends to glare haughtily around them, pretending they’re not really there—unless someone tries to jump the queue, when everybody else immediately falls on top of them with loud, scandalised protestations. In a country where individuality is greatly valued, queuing is regarded as an infringement of personal dignity. Yet, paradoxically, because this is also a very conformist society, the rules for queuing are quite strict.

Italy, on the other hand, appears to have no rules for queuing. At a prosciutto festival in the lovely northern medieval town of Montagnana, I discovered that to follow any rules at all was to ensure no one ever saw your polite little attempts at getting served. Elbows, loudness of voice and super-confidence were the only weapons of choice—but seeing as everyone does it at once, a general schemozzle ensues!

In Tanzania, queues seemed to exist, but were actually a figment of the (Western) imagination. There was a long, patient queue snaking down the street for a bus that had failed to arrive for three days, so we joined it. But once the bus arrived, the queue vanished. In its place was a seething maelstrom of people all fighting to get on the bus at once. Pushed and jostled to the very hopeless end of that non-existent queue, we were pushed and jostled, too, to the far reaches of perception. In a society where individuals struggle hard for survival—and yet where community values are still very important—being nice to tourists plays a remote second fiddle to ensuring you and your cousin and brother-in-law get on the bus.

In the USA, each queuer seemed to have a different approach. People talked a lot, sometimes swaggeringly, sometimes in a more friendly way, but a beady eye was kept closely on what was happening, and complaints were frequent. In the land of individualism, perhaps it goes against the grain to queue quietly, and the queue was never orderly, snaking rather inefficiently, rather than moving logically.

In the United Arab Emirates, the locals do not recognise the existence of such an undignified beast as a queue. A local passport means you sail straight to the top of the longest line. Queues—why, they’re only for Pakistanis and Filipinos, and other members of the worker bee class!

An Australian queue is a different animal again. We are influenced by the British heritage of politeness, but only to some extent. Our vaunted egalitarianism, our distrust of authority, makes us suspicious of queues as a method of social control. Yet we tend to frown on the queue-jumper. The Australian response to that conundrum is to make it appear as if queues don’t really exist; but relying on everyone’s knowledge that they do, in fact. It can be hard, particularly for a foreigner, to know if there is a queue—it is usually spread out, casual, not symmetrical, not neat as in Britain or seething with mass suspicion as in France—but it is definitely there. Occasionally, an individual might be moved to allow someone else to jump the queue—but you cannot depend on it. And it’s a gift freely given; any attempt to pull rank will not work, will in fact, turn the queue right against you. It’s the “battler” who gets the nod—in the bank, the mother with several children and the shopping, in the supermarket queue the old man with his eight items or fewer.

But the queue-jumper will find that despite the seeming casualness, an Australian queue is a tough bird indeed. It is not social obedience, or the playing out of old roles that is at the heart of this toughness. It is, I think, a generalised Australian feeling that no one has the right to do so—because to do so implies assumed privilege. In an Australian queue, everyone is deemed equal. Nobody likes queuing—but woe betide the jumpers, who through boorishness or contemptuous high-handedness, think they can breach that social contract!

In February Sophie Masson began a six-month residency at the Keesing Studio in Paris.