Cuba’s Queue Held Together by “Who Is Last?”

At Cuban banks, bus stops and ration shops, a newcomer commonly asks “¿El último?”—“Who is last?”—and remembers the person immediately ahead. The Washington Post reported in 2015 that shoppers moved among several queues and could step away temporarily because nearby participants remembered one another’s positions.

Bodies need not remain in one unbroken line for the order to survive. A portion of the wait can be used elsewhere because strangers collectively hold one another’s places in memory.