The most nettlesome and persistent institution established in Cuba over the last five decades is the queue. From the first years of the triumph of the Revolution, when scarcity started to be a daily presence, the queue began to generate its own philosophy. No Cuban who has experienced the reality of island life over these past decades is unfamiliar with questions like ‘Who’s last?’ when joining a queue for bread, the bus, or the doctor, and none can suppress a shudder at the sound of the most feared pronouncement for Cubans: ‘That’s the end’, referring to whatever was being sold or offered.
Queues have their own logic, perverse though rigorous. For example, the first in line have a better chance of actually getting the product or service they are waiting for; those at the tail end are almost certain not to.
