meaning of " ochered' "

[Stuart Goldberg]

Physically a "blump," depending on the space, but just as ordered as any 
single-file line ("kto krainii?!"), at least in my experience.  The fact 
that, having established one's position, one can move around and, most 
importantly, occupy other lines -- for the same thing, something else, 
or a different stage of the same thing, is crucial to the process.  Of 
course, the lack of physical transparency can at times lead to arguments 
(stoiali/ne stoiali).

Stuart Goldberg
Georgia Tech



George Kalbouss wrote:
>     This is a great topic.  All cultures have various forms of lines 
> with accompanying
> and often visceral reactions.  The first time I read about this topic 
> was in "Catcher in the
> Rye," -- through Holden Caulfield's refusal to stand on line to see 
> the Radio City Musical
> Hall's Christmas Show.  Anyone who has served in the US military knows 
> about military lines,
> and the accompanying term "hurry up and wait."  In US culture, we even 
> have a regional
> division of people who wait "on line" and people who wait "in line."  
> The Brits don't have
> lines, they have queues.  Americans don't have them,  we "line up," 
> they "queue up."  I don't
> know what they do in Canada.  I never lined up for anything in that 
> country.
>
>     In the Soviet days, I remember getting Intourist guides into 
> arguments with each other
> regarding lines (ochered') and its offspring, tolpa ( kind of a 
> nascent, or pre-ochered' ) and how people refer to
> more than one of them.  It seems that while linguists can readily come 
> up with nominative  and genitive plurals for
> these words,  ordinary people can't that well, especially (mnogo 
> ocheredei? ochered'?) (mnogo tolp? tolop?).
>
>     More than that, there are other cultural differences.  Americans 
> and Brits line up dutifully.
> Russians,  Italians and many other mainland Europeans kind of blump 
> up, they don't really
> line up.  This blump does get smaller as individuals get served, but 
> no one stands
> dutifully behind another.    Does ochered' imply a line (one person 
> behind another), or
> is a blump an ochered'?
>
>     Lots of other cultural differences --  I'm eager to hear more.
>
>
> George Kalbouss
> The Ohio State University
>
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