My buddy Sinn just put up some “dick crack” about who he considers the top 10 PUA’s right now. He was gracious to put me at #7 and call me “massively underrated.” Not really sure what to say. It’s very flattering.

But what I actually wanted to talk about was an interesting experience last night. File the following story under the “Talk to everyone/Be naturally social” lesson of PUA/life.

We finished up the first night in-field of our bootcamp here in Austin and I hopped in a cab to head across town. Usually, as long as the cab driver speaks English and isn’t on his cell phone, I’ll talk to him and ask him where he’s from. I’ve traveled to many countries and studied International Politics in college, so I’m usually genuinely interested what some of these guys’ stories are.

I’d say once in a blue moon I hit a cab driver with some really cool shit to talk about. Well, this guy took the fucking cake.

He was from Ethiopia. I originally related by telling him how my girlfriend travels to Tanzania and does a lot of educational and development work there. Tanzania is close to Ethiopia and Kenya. We talked about Swahili and somehow we got into his life story.

This guy’s family was a high-ranked political family in Ethiopia in the 90’s. His father was one of the main ministers in the government. When he was a teenager his father was assassinated and his family was thrown into exile in Kenya. Not only that, but the opposition party and militants began hunting his family down in Kenya as well. He related stories about hiding in random people’s homes for days, eating leftover food and sometimes not at all with his mother and sisters.

Finally, the American Embassy granted his family asylum in the US and so here he is, driving a cab in Texas. The guy didn’t know his way around town to save his life (objectively, he was a fucking horrible cab driver), missing turns and all sorts of crap. But he was well-spoken, intelligent and extremely interesting.

He turned off the meter in the parking lot and we sat there for another five minutes talking about African governments and the culture of east Africa.

I guess the lesson is you don’t have to number-close or befriend people to get value out of talking to them. It’s also that you never know when someone with an amazing perspective and story is sitting right next to you.