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Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Queue up, please!

The other day, we were in the queue for booking the train tickets to Chennai. There was not much crowd at that time and the last two rows in the ticket-booking center were free. People were also confused which direction the queue was moving.

As we were moving slowly, a man (A) jumped the queue and sat between my friend and me.

We got very angry and thought he must have mistaken that end to be the start of the queue. So we asked him to move to the other end. But he had no idea of budging from that place and pointing to the person sitting in the row before ours (B), said, ”He too jumped the queue. Ask him to maintain the queue. Then I’ll move.”

This answer surprised us. And we told him that if someone does something wrong then it doesn’t mean that you too should follow it. And if he really wanted someone to question that man of his action, why doesn’t he do that for himself?

He was adamant and did not move and repeated what he had said before.

By then, another gentleman rose and demanded an answer from B.Amidst an heated exchange of words, B revealed that he was already in the queue and had been away for a few moments in order to get some reservation forms and that he had also informed about it to his neighbours in the queue.

Well, that settled the matter and an embarrassed A left the place.

I was shocked to see such behaviour from an educated (he looked like one) person like A. Looks like education and civilized behaviour are mutually exclusive.

Where is this country heading to with people like him in this present generation?

No wonder there is crime everywhere around us and all major channels have special series on crime.

If someone else had done something wrong (or illegal) and got away with it, instead of standing up against it, people feel it is their right to do the same. And if they really want to follow someone, why don't they follow someone's good and commendable actions or better still, why don't they set examples(doing something useful and worthy, ofcourse)?

After this incident, we could hear more people being reminded of “Please come in the queue” by the ones behind us.

There was another person there who belonged to another extreme. There came this lady, who looked like she’s from a rich family. She came directly to the counter to ask something … “How much money should I withdraw from the bank to buy a ticket from ABC to XYZ?”

Obviously, she did not get any reply from the lady at the counter except for … yea…“Please come in the queue”.

Let me get to the musical part of my weekend. I bought a keyboard (not the one you get with a computer) and started practicing my lessons on it at home. Though slow at creating music from it, am quite successful at playing something that can be at least recognized as music.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good.. Which song you practised first? 'Happy Birthday to you' ( as everybody does?)
I have always thought about it.I wondered why we are not ready to follow simple rules back at home. I have seen all of us(Indians) queuing up for even bus outside India. May be we like to exhibit that we are extremely 'English' ? However, I still remember seeing a typical desi trying to pitch in between the queue at Empire state,NY and telling 'Ithellam intha oorla kandukka maataangga maamu'...Nobody questioned him though.. but the way they saw him made me feel bad being a fellow Indian..

Arbit said...

The more polished you are, the more you are inclined to queue up appropriately.

Anonymous said...

@ £££

I'm learning Carnatic music. So no way of practising Happy B'day song first. I started off with our very own Sa-Ri-Ga-Ma... also learnt to play 'Shree Gannanatha'...the first Geetham from the Music book, by myself( some kinda achievement!!).


yeah... we take things for granted in our homeland.

@ Karthik

very true!

crsathish said...

i remember booking train tickets online before 2 yrs. carnatic and kb, wow !

Blue Panther said...

Education Doesnt just means the gaining of knowledge but the application of that knowledge into real life situations. We Blame India for a lot o fthings going wrong but in truth, its us indians that are to blame more than anyone or anything else.

ada-paavi!!!! said...

nice to hear tht ur practisin carnatic wit keyboard, not many ppl do tht i guess

and in Qs, the greater the probablity of not being questioned, the greater is the inclination to cut the Q

Deepa said...

Very sorry for such late responses...

@Sathish

yea!!!

@ Bluepanther

But how many of us really understand that applying our knowledge in the real life is the very essence of education and a sign of being well-educated?


@ ada-paavi

yea...keyboard is always associated with Western music.

what should be condemned? cutting the queue or not questioning the defaulter?