When waiting becomes humiliating…

Twenty minutes flew by. We are still waiting & my patience is slowly running out. By the way, it is not just 2 of us (me & my wife), but more than 100 people waiting now & the number is only increasing with each passing minute. Everyone is staring at the strong wooden door which is closed & stopping us from entering inside. The blazer guy peeps out of the wooden door every now & then to estimate the crowd. Every time he opens the door to do so, a strong murmur would arise among the crowd & all of us would look at him eagerly, silently pleading him to let us in. But he would not do so, would only nod & say ‘just a moment’ & go back inside.

Let me describe the scene of action now. It is a basement area which has a waiting region of around 100 sq. ft & has 5 chairs. From the waiting space, there is a small passage which is 30 feet long & 3 ft wide & it leads to the wooden door. That’s the passage where we are waiting patiently and we are standing just 4 feet away from the wooden door. There could be around 20 people before us nearer the door & our chances of getting in, once the door opens, is surely 100%. That’s the only consolation we have & I feel pity for those standing far behind us; they may have to wait for a long time.

With time, the crowd is getting thicker & the noise level is ever increasing. By the way, there is absolutely no ventilation there; no fan, no exhaust and no windows. People grumbling aloud; kids protesting strongly with their parents; babies crying profusely for lack of fresh air; the place was getting totally chaotic gradually. On top of it, there is a disgusting sweat smell in the passage & the lack of ventilation only makes things more complicated. Its suffocation time for us. Another 5 minutes pass by. Now people are there everywhere & we are almost standing on our toes. The place is totally crammed & even the staircase is packed. The mob behind us is constantly pushing to show their frustration / misery & there is a kind of disorder erupting slowly among the crowd.

Iam feeling humiliated standing this way & I ask my wife if we should leave. She thinks for a while & says no. Suddenly a photographer appears on top of the staircase & starts to click pictures of the situation. He was adding insult to the injury & I could have strangled him right there, if he had been in my reach. Every minute is like an hour and Iam almost at the verge of breaking down (with anger). I had become extremely moody & am not even answering my wife properly. Suddenly, the wooden door opens & what caught our attention this time was that it opened wider now. Everyone becomes silent instantly & a small feeling of hope arises in my heart.

We are still not allowed inside, but people from inside start to come out. They are quite shocked to find such a crowd outside & with great difficulty they cross the passage to reach the stairs & walk out. As the people are coming out slowly, there is a struggle going on here among the crowd (surrounding us) to get inside. There was utter commotion for a while; people pushing / lunging forward madly towards the open door & the noise level reaches a crescendo. Atlast, after everyone from inside had walked out, the blazer guy allowed the crowd in. This time the ‘thallu mullu’ was even mightier as everyone wanted to get in fast. Fortunately, we were standing somewhere closer to the door & we were able to get in early.

Once inside, we found there were only 7 rows & people were running here & there to occupy the seats. We also hurried & found a couple of seats in the middle row, when we heard the wooden door closing again. We heaved a sigh of relief & as my BP was becoming normal, I observed the place. It was a medium sized air-conditioned hall & can accommodate only around 100 people. Some people, who had not got seats, were standing in a corner & the blazer guy was asking them to leave the hall & join them in the next group. I was feeling sorry for them as well as for those still stranded outside.

We did not want to spend much time in there, keeping in mind the people waiting outside. We came out in less than 20 minutes to find a much bigger crowd. The sweat stench was almost unbearable now. There were no smiling faces in the crowd, but only annoyed & restless ones. Most of them turned to look at us for a moment, but immediately shifted their glance back to the wooden door.

We swam thru the crowd, came upstairs, walked out slowly to the portico, gave the valet parking slip to the attendee (yes.. it was a star hotel at P.H.road). Our car came within minutes; we boarded & left in a jiffy.

Such mishaps have become very common nowadays. People give a lot of importance to the quality, but not to the arrangements. I only wish that this particular part be better organized in such events, especially when the place is quite small. A disciplined team should be delegated the task of running this department smoothly. Anyhow, it was a different experience for us, not pleasant but different nonetheless.

Now, Wait a minute.. this article is not making sense. Why?.. My God.! I think I had skipped the first paragraph. Iam so sorry. It goes like this..

Last Sunday. We had come to attend our friend’s marriage at a star hotel. It was a grand hall, small though, but very neat & nicely decorated. It was a late muhurtham & the wedding took place by around 11.30am. After meeting the newly weds & wishing them a great life together, we headed towards the dining hall which was at the basement right beneath the marriage hall. Although we were not hungry, we didn’t want to leave without having food & so we went down. There were 10-15 people waiting outside the dining hall (in front of the HOLY(!!) wooden door) & we joined them thinking that we would be going in very soon. The manager of the dining hall, wearing a blazer, requests us to wait. ‘Just a moment’ he says. And we started to wait.

Now, go to top. Hope it makes sense this time.. :-)