After this incident, since many advocated a compromise, they came up with a solution: the queue system. Children now queued up in front of the slide, the seesaw, and the trapeze rings. There was also a rule that children from the east side should not jump over the compound wall before the playground opened. When the gate was opened at four thirty, children entered, pushing and shoving each other to get ahead in the queue. Since the queue system did not entertain differences and disparities between boys and girls, dark-skinned and light-skinned, tall and short, local and visiting, convent-schooled and tinnai-schooled, things often went smoothly. However, the seesaw often got stalled by ill-matched pairs. When the end of the seesaw with a plump kid refused to lift off the ground, the puny one at the other looked on in panic from above. There were kids in the queue who could be good matches for the two stranded children, but the system could only honor the order in which children showed up—it could not entertain any other considerations. So when more such ill-matched pairs showed up, there was an impasse, both with the seesaw as well as with the pleasure of play. Nevertheless, the system could not be changed for this. Any system has its flaws.

When children stood in the queue for a long time, it was natural for them to get tired. Eager for a chance to play on the slide and to swing from the trapeze rings, these kids stood in line until their feet hurt. They kept shifting their weight from one foot to the other. When a boy grew impatient, he looked around, and if he saw a shorter line nearby, he jumped to it. Other kids followed right on his heels. Now that everybody had moved away, they realized that the new line they had joined was now longer than the one they had been standing in, so they rushed back. All this jumping back and forth between lines felt as fun and as tiring as the slide and the seesaw. So, treating it as a game in its own right, they kept at it. Then they grew exhausted and would stop and stand wherever they were. When it grew dark, children toward the end of the line gave up and went home. As they walked away disappointed, they told themselves they wouldn’t be coming back to the playground. But by the next evening, their desire to play would overcome their frustration, and they would be back at the playground. They came running as fast as they could, determined to get ahead in the line. And they stood in line for a long time.

They teared up when they thought of their plight. Whenever the attendant Daweed walked away to pee or to smoke a beedi, they all cursed him unanimously. They blamed him for everything.