Has anyone been to the Lying In State and wished they hadn't bothered?

[Reallybadidea]

Just being nosey really. I'm not the most patient of people and can't imagine queuing for hours for anything. Has anyone been and found it a bit of a letdown once they got to the end (beginning?) of The Queue?

It’s utter madness. If I dragged a toddler in the freezing cold to queue for 20 hours to see the coffin of my favourite pop star I’d fully expect some sort of intervention from child services for cruelty. There was a woman interviewed on the news with a four year old, insisting the child ‘loved the Queen’ and was desperate to ‘help bury her’. Terrible.

This is a great question because I don’t understand how you can queue for 7 hours to simply view and walk past a coffin. I genuinely don’t understand it?

But what about the kids themselves?!

How utterly shit for them
How utterly shit of their parents

So, so far we've not found a person that regretted it just a whole lot of judging people queuing...I paid my respects in Scotland, queue was mixed demographics and it was memorable.

I'm on the train home, having queued from 00.50 Thursday night till 14.30ish on Friday when we actually went past the coffin. I dont regret doing it but I wouldn't do it again and if I had known how long it would take I would not have done it. Yes I felt bad for the children. Most of them obviously didn't want to be there.

Someone I know who queued for over 13 hours said it was "well worth it in the end". But then they would, wouldn't they?

I’ve not come across anyone in real life who went. It’s fine if people want to do it but I doubt very much the queen would have felt it was a necessary way to commemorate her.

I could imagine it to be disappointing but then at the same time, people must know what it is they're queuing up for.

I find the whole thing quite bizarre really and can't imagine why anybody would want to go! However, 'different folks, different strokes', as they say!

I think the main push for bring there is to aquire an enduring social media memory post to say I was there.

I'm not going to judge the type of person that goes by age, ethnicity, non vaxxer, 🤨class/social demographic etc
...but I might judge the rationale of taking a young child who hasn't chosen for themselves to be there...

Ditto. No one in my family nor friendship group or work colleagues even considering going

and we are 40 min train to London

I have noticed this and I think it's a case of, when you're driving down the motorway or a very well known route and sort of zone out and get there and your elite "wow that went quick, I don't even remember it!" I recon they've been walking at that pace for so long that they've zoned out and forgotten to look at the coffin.

I went overnight Thursday and it took about 12 hours.
I was surrounded by a wide demographic, more than I expected. People had come after work Thurs and had Friday off, or were going to do Friday meetings remotely (rather them than me) or in other ways arranged their lives. I was also surprised how far people had come.
I was actually in the hall about 25 mins as the guard changed just I got to the top of the steps, and again just before I got to the coffin.
Was it worth it....well yes, to me it was. I said my thanks for her years of service, and took the wishes of my parents who didn't think they could queue but liked knowing they had a representative.
It might be seen as a waste of effort, but I like being a tiny piece of history.

Well it wasn't forced on these people like in North Korea. And there were many motivations for this, pilgrimage, thanks, respect, nosey, the crowd, history etc. A gathering of all sorts for all kinds of reasons.

I think I would have liked to go myself just for the experience and obviously respect, but I am sure I would have turned around and gone to the nearest hostelry after an hour.

Hats off to those with the patience and the stamina, and steel bladders to see it through.

Hopefully you're just really poor at expressing yourself in writing otherwise it makes it look like you're saying that people from Manchester are invariably poor?

What on earth do you mean

Wow that’s some classic north/south divide snobbery there.

Nobody in the godforsaken northern realms of Manchester has ever been to that there London clearly 🙄

Felt sorry for the people going past the other night on right hand side, a very over zealous security man shooo-ing people on asap even when they were doing a bow. Very disrespectful security man.

I went but only to support my mum going and definitely felt a little embarrassed about going. I'd say the actual thing is obviously not worth the queue and I think people who say it's well worth it either experienced it on a different emotional level or are lying! BUT if you take the whole experience together, it's something I'll never forget, I got to chat with my mum for 12 hours and, in the same way I enjoyed running a half marathon once, I quite enjoyed testing my limits. Met some interesting people, saw London at night and was something quite bizarre and unusual.

I asked my mum afterwards if she was glad we came. If she'd said no I may have chucked her in the Thames ;)

Demographic was very mixed in age, gender and race.

I would imagine most people thought it was worth it.

I wonder how many people dropped out of the queue. I am the type who would think it was a good idea but I wouldn’t have stood in the cold for very long and would probably have given up and gone home.

I would have loved to have gone.
My health's not up to it, sadly. I just very much wanted to BE there & say thank you, God Bless, in person. Nothing to do with history, North Korea, or being black, white, rich or poor. It really is that simple!

I signed the Church of England memoriam book & went to church to light a candle. Definitely have rather been in London or Scotland though.

I think you're right. I dont agree with children being taken, its not just the queue itself, lets say its 'only' 12 ghours, but then theres the getting to the queue, getting back from the queue, waiting for trains or buses,, getting food, finding the loos etc etc Nightmare

I dont have an issue with people who want to go but I admit a bit of a judgemental thing about people that just want to go to say they've been. I have more time for people who go who feel that it means something (even though I dont feel that for myself personally)

Someone at work is like this, banging on about how all of this is quite manipulative, get rid of the monarchy etc but then really liked the idea that her young adult daughter wants to go because all her friends are going and she doesnt want to be the one out of her mates who hasnt gone. Hypocrite.

I enjoy watching it all however.

if all of these people could somehow have waited for 5 minutes or so and then walked straight in, without all the big build-up, whether many of them would actually have bothered to do so?

Very true. It’s so fascinating. We are tribal by nature. We follow the pack. “I needed to pay my respects” - what does it actually mean? All those younger people and foreigners, are they really there to pay some sort of homage to the British queen or are they gathering a memory for the future? I think the latter. No harm, of course but utterly fascinating. I must confess my guilty pleasure at the moment is to watch the live camera, especially late at night when I should be asleep. I can’t turn it off!

I actually didn't think the crowd looked "so white" but I'm not either so perhaps I notice it more, though - as unpopular as it is now - I'm not one to care much about colour

my parents were immigrants and my mum has been saying she feels many immigrants are more appreciative of the UK generally, and that she really noticed a high proportion of non whites in the crowd. She fell into the old trap of saying "immigrants" and I had to remind her she didn't know how many were born here.

I agree most people won't say if they left the queue. I also suspect many arrived and then looked at it, then pottered off to a pub or restaurant instead.

I wonder if it's the whole history side of thing that must appeal. I would have been disappointed to only be allowed to spend a few seconds in front of the coffin!