About Me

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About:






Born & raised in Lahore, Pakistan, I, Zaid Hassan, got here to Austin, Texas as fast as I possibly could!

After moving to the States in '02, I joined McCallum High School in Austin as a sophomore, & still became the Prom King of my class despite the short time period! I'm among the only 10% proud left-handed humans in the world. I'm a distance runner & already have a couple of marathons & countless road races under my belt. I'm an avid fan / player of cricket, basketball, football / soccer, tennis, & rock-paper-scissors. I'm fluent in Urdu, Hindi, English, & in the process of tackling Arabic. And I'm also a big fan of Stephen T. Colbert!

On the basis of all of the above, many friends aptly titled me once as "the best American import since freedom fries." I could not have agreed any more!

All the aforementioned lighthearted talk aside, I'm tremendously privileged & have a wonderful life. I'm strengthened, supported, & uplifted by my inspiring parents & a wonderful young brother - the three of whom have always been by my side from road trips to Himalayas in Pakistan, to individual milestones during marathons in Texas. I'm also privileged & very thankful for the opportunity to pursue my ideas & ideals through my education, where I study Government, the philosophical underpinnings of politics, & concentrate on areas of international relations.

With Texas 4000, I'm looking forward to ride for my late Aunt Zakia Phoppo, aid in the fight against cancer, spread hope within the cancer community, & raise cancer awareness. But I'm also riding to explore, charter, test, convince, represent, share, realize, accomplish, develop, and change. I'm accordingly thrilled beyond words for all the endless possibilities.

To sum it up, I'm a skinny kid, with a funny name, born & raised in Lahore, Pakistan, migrated to States in '02, presently studying Government at the University of Texas, always excited for the opportunities, ultimately hoping to work in public service, & currently anticipating to partake in Texas 4000!

Why I Ride

Until last November, I was among the rare fortunate few not to have anyone immediately around me struggling against cancer. But then Zakia Phoppo was diagnosed & she lost her fight after a brief struggle of only a few months. Her declining health in the last few days & the painful struggle brought the true nature & enormity of cancer into actual perspective for the first time in my life. Even more heartbreaking was the distance between all of us from Austin to Lahore, & the inability to be by her side at the time of her passing.

Even though I've personally almost always felt capable, empowered, strong, & powerful enough to solve the intricacies of the routinely problems I face in life, I felt absolutely incapable, weak, & completely powerless against cancer. It's hard to describe the desperate state of mind & the hopelessness.

While cancer was spreading & the situation getting worse in Lahore, here I was in Austin, coincidentally learning about another disease & our perpetual struggle against it from a history class with Prof. Oshinsky's "Polio: An American Story." The book interestingly documents the polio epidemic in the U.S. during 1940s & 1950s & examines the race to find its cure. It also describes a new era in approaches to public philanthropy, grassroots fundraising, & explains how the struggle was taken to be more than just a disease.

It is this book & lessons learned from this class that provide my answer on fighting cancer. To fight cancer, I believe that we must view it not just as a disease, but also as a problem to be solved. A problem understood & solved only through combinations of ingenuity, voluntarism, determination, & resources. Just as the mantra of "we will conquer polio" reverberated across the post-WWII era, we must also stand up & reassure ourselves that someday "we will also conquer cancer." Self-determination is one of the greatest assets possessed by the human race. We can strongly stand up against cancer, but only on the basis of firm determination & commitment. Eradication, or mitigation, will surely follow at some point.

The folks living during the terrifying polio epidemic could have never imagined breaking free of the disease in their lifetime. Many even succumbed to the terrible disease in this struggle. However, we now know the eventual fate of polio & stand here today grateful for the efforts of those that tackled and eradicated it. Similarly, we might not live long enough & see a cure for cancer in our lifetime. But that should not prevent us from searching for solutions & keeping hope alive. We must do our part by contributing all we possibly can to research funding to see a successful conclusion.

I lost Zakia Phoppo to cancer in a manner similar to many others. Hopefully, a day will come when this will be reversed & the generations that follow will instead cherish the contributions of our generation, just like our generation now recognizes and appreciates the triumph against polio.

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