I dunno what your life goals are, but this is very emphatically one of mine:
Although a carpet cleaner by trade, Vaughn Smith's real gift is for words. He is what linguists call a hyperpolyglot — defined as a person who can speak at least 11 languages.
"It's not something like, 'Oh, yeah, I'm the best,'" the 46-year-old told CBS News. "I was just the guy cleaning the carpets."
But he doesn't just know 11 languages. As the Washington Post recently verified, he is fluent in or can carry on a conversation in 24 languages, though he estimates he's learned more than 40 different languages.
The guy can effectively communicate in more than two dozen languages and can't even really nail the total number of languages he can speak to some degree. Meanwhile, the rest of us are over here like:
Smith—who has autism—has learned enough languages that he knows not to waste any words when he does speak:
Steve Hartman: Do people immediately like you more when you speak their language?
Vaughn Smith: Most of the time, yes.
Hartman: Is that part of the draw for you?
Smith: Yes.
I might call this man to clean my carpets just so I can get a quick German lesson from him!
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