Hero Story - Born On a Blue Day

Daniel Paul Tammet (born January 31, 1979, London, England) is a British autistic savant gifted with a facility for mathematics problems, sequence memory, and natural language learning. He was born with congenital childhood epilepsy.
Experiencing numbers as colors or sensations is a well-documented form of synesthesia, but Tammet is unique in how specific and detailed his mental imagery of numbers is. He claims that in his mind each number, up to 10,000, has its own unique shape and feel, and he can "sense" whether a number is prime or composite and "see" results of calculations as landscapes in his mind. He has described his visual image of 289 as particularly ugly, 333 as particularly attractive, and pi as beautiful.[1]
Tammet holds the European record for memorising and recounting pi to 22,514 digits in just over five hours.[2] This sponsored charity challenge was held in aid of the National Society for Epilepsy (NSE) on “Pi Day,” 14 March 2004 at the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford, UK.[3] The NSE was chosen to benefit from this event because of Daniel's experience with epilepsy as a young child. Professor Allan Snyder at the Australian National University said of Tammet: “Savants can't usually tell us how they do what they do. It just comes to them. Daniel can. He describes what he sees in his head. That's why he's exciting. He could be the ‘Rosetta Stone.’”[4]
He can speak at least English, French, Finnish, German, Spanish, Lithuanian, Estonian, Icelandic, and Esperanto. He likes Estonian very much because it is rich in vowels. He has even changed his surname to the Estonian-based word Tammet, which comes from the Estonian word tamm meaning “oak.” Tammet is creating a new language called Mänti. Mänti has many features related to Finnish and Estonian, both of which are Finno-ugric languages. Some sources credit Tammet as creating the Uusisuom and Lapsi languages as well.[5]
He was the subject of a documentary in the UK titled The Boy With The Incredible Brain that was broadcast on Five on May 24, 2005 (also broadcast under the title "Brainman"). It showed highlights of his feat of recalling pi as well as his meeting with Kim Peek, another individual who is famous for having savant skills. In one emotional moment of the show, Peek hugged Tammet and told him, "Some day you will be as great as I am."
Tammet claims he can learn a new language within a week. For the documentary film about him, Tammet was challenged to learn Icelandic. Seven days later he appeared on Icelandic television to be interviewed. One of the interviewers said on camera that Tammet responded to questions. Segments of the interview, showing Tammet responding to questions in Icelandic, were televised on the American News show 60 Minutes.[1] The video is available on CBS' website . It was clear Tammet's speech in Icelandic were actual responses to questions. He is a keen and improving golfer.
In 2006, Tammet traveled to the United States to promote his memoir, Born On A Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant. While there, he appeared on several television talk shows, and specials including 60 Minutes.
Tammet created and operates the online e-learning company, Optimnem. He lives in Kent with his partner Neil Mitchell, a software engineer.

The passage of the mythological hero may be overground, incidentally; fundamentally it is inward -- into depths where obscure resistances are overcome, and long lost, forgotten powers are revivified, to be made available for the transfiguration of the world. This deed accomplished, life no longer suffers hopelessly under the terrible mutilations of ubiquitous disaster, battered by time, hideous throughout space; but with its horror visible still, its cries of anguish still tumultuous, it becomes penerated by an all-suffusing, all-sustaining love, and a knowledge of its own unconquered power. Something of the light that blazes invisible within the abysses of its normally opaque materiality breaks forth, with an increasing uproar. The dreadful mutilations are then seen as shadows, only, of an immanent, imperishable eternity; time yields to glory; and the world sings with the prodigious, angelic, but perhaps finally monotonous, siren music of the spheres. Like happy families, the myth and the worlds redeemed are all alike.
Joseph Campbell The Hero with a Thousand Faces