In 2024, a loudspeaker at a 24-hour dim sum shop in Blok M, South Jakarta, called out “order 241.” Near an MRT entrance and Taman Literasi park, customers sat or stood on the pavement waiting for food. Numbering preserved collection order without requiring everyone to remain in one straight physical line.
The same account noted weekend and holiday waits exceeding ninety minutes for bread and doughnuts made in shops nearby. When demand for fashionable food exceeded indoor space, the public pavement became an improvised waiting room. A number freed customers from shuffling forward continuously, but kept them within hearing distance.
The figure 241 identified an order rather than necessarily counting the people present. Even when the visible line dissolved, the sequence remained. One amplified voice connected people scattered along the pavement into an invisible queue.