India, June 29 -- How long would you queue up at a restaurant for? Would you stand outside the door for 45 minutes till they let you in? A whole hour?

I guess it depends on how much you care. I don't queue up at restaurants at all. I think it's ageist for restaurants to not take reservations and to insist that people hang around on the street till they condescend to let them in.

But there are people who disagree with me. Many diners think nothing of waiting for two hours or more for a table. Over a decade ago when the New York baker Dominique Ansel invented the cronut, the rush to buy this cross between a croissant and a donut was such that the line outside his bakery would start at six in the morning.

The concept of having to queue up...