During my undergraduate days at SOAS, an English chap in the Japanese Section introduced me to the expression “swan’s feet”: to the observer, the swan is gliding smoothly and calmly on the water but under the surface the feet are paddling madly. (I can’t find it under google, so he must’ve invented it.*)
I remember going to a job interview for the post of secretary at a lawyers’ firm in 1974.
It was my first secretarial post after graduating from secretarial school, my previous job being as a telex operator at Conoco Western Pacific in Singapore (an American oil company, now ConocoPhillips).
I’d driven there after my morning telex shift, got stuck in the traffic, arrived late, sweaty and stressed out and anxious and nervous and flustered.
Sat there opposite the three partners, wringing my hands under the table as they fired questions at me.
There was also a test of course: dictation, shorthand, and typing out the dictated document in triplicate.
Anyway, I got the job.
All three partners told me later how impressed they’d been with me — sitting there so calm and confident during the interview!!
Classic swan’s feet, though I didn’t know the term at the time.
(Singapore, 1974)
*Thanks to Valerio for unearthing this:
https://www.horebinternational.com/the-swan-metaphor/#:~:text=We%20don't%20see%20the,They%20are%20like%20white%20swans.
