AIBU to wonder if queuing is a British thing, what on earth do the rest of the world do??

[RubyCav]

I have heard quite a few people state "queuing is a British thing". So what I really can't work out is, how general life would work without people forming nice orderly ques. So I'm turning to mumsnet wisdom to help me understand.

My favourite on planes was a recent flight I do regularly for work. When we arrived the plane parked up so far from the terminal we were obviously going to be getting one of those airport buses. Everyone (except me and a couple of other folk) leapt up before the seatbelt sign was even off as usual, pushing and shoving to get their stuff.

I was last off the plane, last on the bus, first off the bus and first through arrivals :)

Karma I've never got the plane thing either! Apart from I have had an incident where I had no room for my case overhead as I did my ususal last on routine. Used to travel every week and it always made laugh watching them rush to que in a tunnel!

wason I used to do that too lol

Canadians like a good queue - they even form one at the gate at the airport when they don't need to

They are very polite - there's generally a lot of apologizing and 'after you...' going on in crowded situations

When I worked in a filling station more than thirty years ago, there was no shortage of people who would march past the queue and throw cash on the counter and walk out.

I remember about 20 year ago I was at a small rural petrol station where the till had stopped working so the assistant had to write everything out by hand. This meant that there was quite a queue and each payment was taking time. The assistant was very apologetic and kept explaining the situation to the queue. Everyone was being very understanding.
Some knob that was full of his own self importance blustered in and huffed and puffed at the end of the queue. After a couple of minutes he barged to the front effing and blinding that he was far too busy for this kind of carry on. He threw £30 at the assistant and huffed and puffed on his way.
In those days petrol was about 60p a litre. The assistant took great pleasure in pointing out to the rest of the queue that he had just paid for 30 litres of petrol and not £30.

But why do supermarkets not use the one queue system???

But why do supermarkets not use the one queue system???

ASDA do for the self serve basket tills

Also in Budapest metro rush hour an elderly nun elbowed me out of the way!

for a nun to do it it must be the standard way to "queue" there.

DesolateWaist

I imagine this Nun to be like Whoopie Goldberg

I eyeballed a 14 year old boy in McDonalds and said: 'I don't think so' when he tried to push in. He shuffled off.

Maybe I reminded him of his mum or even granny. But it felt good.

Self-service checkouts tend to be grouped, so there is one queue only.

I go to one supermarket where they have a one queue system for half the tills. It's not very efficient, actually. By the time you are called, the previous customer is already paying and you still have to unload your shopping and then pack it up. It's okeish if there are two of you, but not if you are alone.

I love British queues until it comes to the sheer arrogance of the "first come first served". When I was very heavily pregnant and barely able to walk (but had to stand in a queue because that's how we do things) everyone would look at me, see the pain I was in and turn back around. Even in the supermarket if I had a couple of items and they had a trolley Very self-entitled!

I'm also as polite as possible with buses and will always let the elderly/disabled on in front of me with my pram (unless I'm in a desperate rush to the doctors or something) to make sure they get a space, and I would put money on it that someone in their 50's jumps in with the "elderly". Like, mate I'm 25 you aren't "old" to me

Still laughing at the scoundrel story. I might use that one day.

I was queuing in a shop a few months ago, one person at the till, me at the bit that says 'wait here', noone else in line. A man rushes up, puts his bits on one of the empty counters then moves along to pick up some batteries. The girl serving says 'next' and he zooms and puts his things at her till. I walk up, put my things down and say that I was actually in the queue. He (posh English very important man) shouts 'well why on earth didn't you say that then' (err I just did, why don't you look at the queue?) 'oh just shut up' he rages at me and moves his things. The girl serving (maybe Spanish or Italian, not sure) apologises to him, questions me on whether I was actually in the queue or not (!) and gives me a disgusted look. Hmm. I have refused to go back in the shop again :)

Oh and I was waiting for the bus one day, about 4 of us went to get on, I was first at the door (vague queuing system) but I turned to let the person behind me on (he was much older/looked like he had some kind of disability), just as I was nearly at the point of making eye contact with him and about to gesture for him to get on first he shouts really roughly, 'well get an effing move on then'. Made me quite sad for trying to be polite!

I love it when there is one 'queue here' sign which is quite far away from the check outs (often in chemists) and someone doesn't see the q and then watches someone leave and rushes forward thinking, oh that was a bit of luck, and everyone says 'ahem, the q's here mate' and they go 'oh bollocks' and huff as if you are being really unreasonable and pull a sort of can't you just let me go face. My mum and dad's local co-op is great for this. The q snakes round the whole shop and from the door you can't really see the start, so people rush in pick up a loaf and then rush to the front. Then they see the q and realise all of us just have a loaf too, so they aint going first! Sometimes if you are lucky they will chuck the bread back and swear and storm out as if we are conspiring bastards

Australia - queues everywhere, it's huge over here.

hotdiggedy

I often get in buses ahead of older/frailer people, mostly because I'm already there and I am faster, but then walk past the reserved seats so that they can get them.
The getting on the bus (or other public transport) is not so much the problem.

A couple of years ago my friends and I were in Majorca and decided to take a bus to and from the local market.

The outward journey was completed with no hassle. The return journey however...

We had to go to the bus station, find out which stop the bus departed from and discovered it would be a ten minute wait. No problem. We obediently hovered around the appropriate stop, chatting to another group of three English women -grandmother, mother and daughter. The grandmother had very swollen ankles due to the heat and was in some discomfort.

After twenty minutes we were slightly concerned that no bus had appeared at our stop; however there was one further along. So we trotted over, adjuring the other three to wait where they were while we found out what was happening. Lo and behold, our bus was at the new stop. We beckoned our new friends over and waited patiently by the bus for the door to open. We were joined by a large throng of people, some tourists, some local.

After another few minutes the bus driver gestured, somewhat irritably, at another bus that had pulled in nearer our original stop. The throng immediately turned and swarmed towards it- leaving us near the back of the crowd.

Well, one of my friends was having None Of That. She strode ahead, grim-faced with determination, and wriggled and edged her way to the front of the crowd surrounding the bus door. Our other friend and I, along with our three new friends, stood Britishly towards the back looking embarrassed and apologetic. But Determined Friend got onto the bus, bought 6 tickets and then the bus driver stood up and made the crowd part in front of us, allowing free passage through and onto the bus.

On the school bus in the Caribbean it was full-on cartoon-style cloud-of-dust with satchels and elbows melee.

I queued on the first day and they drive off without me.

The conductor said afterwards he thought I was 'just standing about.'

farty that made me chuckle