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Queues and welcomes

Lomaster

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1) In a situation where end of a queue is not obvious, how does one inquire for who the last person in the line is? My guess being 「すみません、最後尾は？」. Also when a queue's end is obvious does one simply join it without drawing attention? And finally is cutting in line acceptable if i notice a friend/a friend notices me standing somewhere in the middle of a line?

2) Is it unnatural to welcome a person to a flat/house with 上がって（ください） if the flat/house has no genkan, steps or any other rise whatsoever? Also it appears to me that ようこそ is only used by stores, hotels, restaurants and other customer-related establishments. Would using ようこそ to invite someone into my dwelling sound weird?
 
I don't think I've ever run into a situation here where the end of the line wasn't obvious. Japanese are very good at lining up. There are often little machines which spit out numbers to tell one what place they are in line, for example at my local post office.

Anecdotally, in Ikebukuro station there's a shop that sells these delicious smelling tarts and always has a long line. One day I noticed a line a bit of a ways away which appeared to lead nowhere. It was demarked by posts much like airport lines IIRC, and was back and forth so the line itself formed a snake-like square. The people at the front were just waiting there, and other people kept joining the back. Quite odd, to say the least, but I figured "Whelp, just Japanese people being Japanese, I guess." It turns out that this is the overflow line for the main line for the tart shop.

As I said, Japanese people are very good at lining up, in my experience.
 
1)
I would say すみません、ここ最後尾/一番後ろですか？
Yes.
Usually no.

2)
Those are not wrong, but 入って/お入りください and いらっしゃい are more common, respectively.
 
WonkoTheSane said:
There are often little machines which spit out numbers to tell one what place they are in line, for example at my local post office.
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Good to know there are electronic queue systems installed throughout Japan Post offices. I just imagined some rural post office with live queue. But then again queues are probably unheard of in rural post offices.

Toritoribe
Thanks for your input. No questions left.
 
In less genteel settings you well hear ケツ used to refer to the end of the line.
 
I pass through Ikebukuro station nearly every day and know exactly the shop you mean - it sold cream puffs until recently. They also had a shop assistant to help people make the transformation from the overflow queue to the main queue. Actually, I found the fact that people were prepared to wait so long for overpriced cream puffs (about 250 yen each!) in an unpleasant environment (the underbelly of Ikebukuro station is not very nice!) a bit depressing.
 
Lomaster said:
The fact itself is pretty amusing.
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It certainly is. That's why I felt it best to clarify, just in case.

You may as well learn the the verb for breaking line while we're on the subject.

割り込む
 
@Mike Cash
I'd rather learn the verb for docilely joining the end of a line, if you please?
 
Lomaster said:
@Mike Cash
I'd rather learn the verb for docilely joining the end of a line, if you please?
Click to expand...

The other is useful even if you're not the one doing it.

To join the line is 並ぶ.
 
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