Saving places / re-entering the line

[Garet]

Funny I see this thread since I wrote this in my last TR of someone abusing it here in Korea because the park gives away and then takes back ride re-entry passes at the entrance of the ride people can line up for 10 seconds and push 70 minutes later. I'm not a fan of queue jumping at all but considering I'm a kindergarten teacher not far away and I nearly always bump into students around the park with parents I normally have to grit my teeth just incase of parents nearby. I I had told a staff member they were jumping before I said no to letting them pass me since it was right at the station and told them they would have to wait behind me (so about 4 boats worth of people).

 

I went to try out the new Super Flume ride but unfortunately had a really bad experience with a queue jumping family. The Korean man and his wife decided since they had young-ish children (the height restriction is a meter) that they could let some of the family (including adults) wait outside the ride and then rang the family when they had waited out the 70 minute line to increase their group (I understand a bit of Korean being married to one.) Despite all the signs saying no queue jumping, once they got to the end of line they rang the rest of the group who pushed past over 1 hour of switchbacks and when they got to me (about 2-3 mins from riding) I refused to let them pass. The man started screaming at me (in broken English) that it was none of my business, I had to be a gentlemen, that this was Korea (I pointed out the signs that said no cuts in Korean and also a world-wide policy of theme parks) and then using the excuse the little girl had needed the bathroom and calling me out on that. The man then was screaming at me to shut-up when I said no and tried to jump the fence to hit me. This was all right next to the station where the operators and staff did nothing.

 

Here's the thing though, for the whole line nobody went past me to leave and they were using their phones to constantly inform the rest of the group where they were in the line. They had never set foot in the line and even if it really was the younger ones needed the bathroom that's not an excuse to then skip the complete whole line when so many other families are patiently waiting.

 

With the guy getting more and more angry and wide-eyed and only one young girl on the staff trying to defuse the situation, I ended up apologizing to him and giving a deep bow that I hadn't let his family "go to the bathroom", I didn't want to see some-one like the staff get hurt because of a situation I made and it seemed like the only way to get him to calm down even though the people had already gone past me by this point that he wasn't going to stop. The staff then put the group on the next boat and tried to put me right behind them so I had to ask to wait a few boats because I didn't want the guy waiting for me at the exit.

 

Being in Korea, i've got used to a lot of line jumping but to deliberately time it to skip the whole line was not something I was OK with. It was also disappointing when my wife spoke to management later that although they apologized for the staff's lack of action in a violent situation, they informed her that they hand out passes when people leave the queue to let them back in and that they'd asked the staff at the station about the incident who had said the people had a pass which 1) nobody left the line in the first place so how did they get the pass that said they left? 2) if that is the case and whole groups can leave for over an hour for the "bathroom" why have signs throughout the line saying you cannot cut in line? and 3) They had nothing like a pass when they tried to cut. It might have been taken away at the entrance of the ride instead of the station but then why did the station staff say they saw a pass when we spoke to management? Management have promised to email me sometime this week though, so I'll see what they say but was I in the wrong? Should it be different for a family that cuts than groups of teenagers?

 

The parks response to the situation was 'we have to let people go to the bathroom' even when I pointed out there was never anyone who left the line in the first place. Apparently the passes are handed out and taken away at the very start of the queue which seems to defeat the purpose of even having the personally. It does seem a bit of a catch-22 for the park since I see so many families with children queue jump here in Asia with just the father holding the line than I see teenagers (they are there too though) and when it's the main demographic doing it even when you have signs and somehow its 'culturally acceptable' what can they do?