Long Long queue.

Queues have always been a part of my life. They have always taught me a thing or two. They have taught me that patience is a virtue. They have taught me that nothing comes easy. You have to work for it. They have taught me that success comes to those who 'move ahead' in life. They have also taught me that sometimes the shortest distance between two points is not a straight line !!! From a very young age we have been quite used to standing in queues, waiting for our turn, in anticipation, waiting with all our will just to see the shuffle of feet of the people standing in front of you. So many times have we found ourselves being jealous of the person who is at the front most position in the line. So many times have we seen an exasperated look of someone who's been shown the end of a long queue, and has been asked to stand at the end of it, because he / she has just arrived. All our bill payments, admissions, form submissions, even in some areas the daily nature calls have involved standing in long queues. Many a times we have to stand out in the open, in the baking hot sun. Tempers run high at such times and any slack shown by the staff (whos taking the submission of bills etc.) is followed by bickering of people in the line and often by hurling of abuses openly. Anyone who tries to enter out of turn is yelled upon and is forced to his rightful place at the end of the line !!! Many a times I have seen a short queue of people forming near the door of a building. Later I have discovered that the same queue starts inside the building two floors above the floor where the same door is !!!

If you want to see the perfect expression of exasperation on a person's face.........Look at the person who's just seen how long the queue is and has come to stand in it.

If you want to see the perfect expression of hope and longing on a person's face ..........Look at the person who's standing in the middle of a long queue.

If you want to see the perfect expression of tension on a person's face.........Look at the person who's ahead in the queue.....cause he'll be worried........he'll be hoping that the work for which he came for and stood in the line gets done successfully.

If you want to see the perfect expression of relief and happiness on a person's face....Look at the person who's just finished his work at the counter after standing for hours in a long queue.

Today I went to a bank to open a public provident fund account. I wanted to deposit the minimum opening deposit money. The lady who checked the new account opening form asked me to deposit the money at the single window counter. There were three rows of chairs in the bank near the counters. All three rows were occupied by people. I assumed that they were sitting there to withdraw money or for other official purposes. As I wanted to deposit money, I went to one of the counters, thinking that my job would be over quickly, when I get a 'deposited' stamp on my deposit slip. When I went to one of the windows, the security guard told me to wait in the queue. It was then, to my astonishment, that I discovered that, the three rows of chairs occupied by people was indeed a queue and now I was at the end of the queue. Instead of a standing queue it was a sitting one and everytime someone at the start of the queue finished their work, the queue would shift and each person would move his ass to the next chair !!! Foolish, I thought, why dont they simply call the next person instead of making all the people shift from their places by one position everytime? But then thats how things work here.

Anyway after 45 minutes of exasperation, longing, hope and tension..........I opened my PPF account and made my first deposit......and went home a happy and relieved man!!!!

P.S: Qatar = queue. In india queues are so long, they seem to extend from India to Qatar, maybe that's why they say qatar in hindi.

P.S2: That was a bad joke. I am sorry.