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Life & Arts

Student explores a plethora of passions

NASA engineer, ballet dancer, pre-med student and activist says success is about not fearing rejection

by KIM THAI
The Daily Cougar

For most students, a balanced schedule and careful time management are what get them through each semester. For 28-year-old pre-med student and ballet dancer Nicholas Saadah, having a fixed schedule is key to getting through each day. 

Saadah walks into NASA's doors at 8 a.m. and heads over to the Automation, Robotics and Simulation Division where he begins a round of meetings. Throughout the day, he solves extensive equations and explains to management his division's latest analysis on the space station's 50-foot robotic arm.

At 4:30 p.m., he steps out of the aerospace world and drives to UH to make his 5:30 p.m. organic chemistry class. When class ends at 7 p.m., he leaves immediately to catch the second half of ballet rehearsal and practices for his dance company's coming performance. Finally, he makes his way home around 9:30 p.m. to do homework and stretch. 

This is a typical Monday or Wednesday for Saadah. On other weekdays, his life is similar, except he doesn't have class and he has to switch dancing shoes because of the three different companies (Houston Repertoire Ballet, City Ballet Houston, Ballet Theater Houston) he works for. He said his life isn't as hectic as people think, and Saadah feels privileged to be able to explore all his passions simultaneously.

"I have been fortunate to have (done) quite a bit at a young age. I think the reason for this is that I'm not afraid of rejection," Saadah said. "I look back at things that I've accomplished and quite honestly, I think the difference between (myself) and others is not that I am more talented or more capable, but I am less afraid of rejection. For every accomplishment, I have half a dozen rejections, but I have learned not to take them personally.

"I think that I will always be a passionate person, but the things I am passionate (about) have and will continue to change. At the end of the day, I want to die being able to say I tried everything. A life where I never let a fear of failure get in my way is one of which I think I can be proud."

Saadah is a post-baccalaureate student who returned to school in summer 2006 at UH in search of a career change. Even while Saadah was working on his aerospace engineering degree at Purdue University, he was taking pre-med prerequisites as well. He was, and still is, interested in both subjects. But the difference is that now he has come to realize what kind and how much of a difference he can make once he changes occupations. 

"I've realized that I'm much happier as an individual who can have a major effect on a small number of people, as opposed to being someone who can have a small effect on a large number of people," Saadah said. "When you work on a large enterprise like the space program, you have to be the kind of person that makes a small difference in a large number of lives."

For Saadah, medicine has been something lingering in his mind for some time. 

"I always knew I didn't want to spend my whole life as an engineer," he said. "I think it's time for (a change). I think the space program is a really noble endeavor; it's just not for me anymore." 

Saadah hopes to be a general practitioner, but knows that might change. What he's most interested in is helping people. 

"I grew up in a family involved in medicine. I remember as a little kid going to my father's office and watching him work," he said. "I was so fascinated that decisions he made were so influential. I became interested while watching my father work. I never saw the negative impact a doctor could have. I hope I never will." 

Like medicine, Saadah's passion for dance began at a young age. He took up tap dancing, but a tap instructor recommended he try ballet. Saadah was hesitant because of assumptions that came with the form, but he said he was soon hooked and now laughs at the gender stereotypes that made him initially resistant. 

Saadah said preserving his passion is part of why he doesn't want to make dance a career. 

"(Dance) is what I really live for. I would not want to be a full-time dancer," he said. "I don't want to do that, not because of how much money I would make -- I'm clearly not in it for the money. I've noticed weeks when I've had lots and lots of rehearsal, I enjoy it less because it stops being a release and it starts being a job."

Another part of Saadah's life that he is proud of is his volunteer work for Planned Parenthood and his lobbying efforts in Austin. He manages to squeeze this into his schedule on Saturday mornings, when he escorts women inside the clinics to avoid harassment and protect them from what he calls "the wall of hatred." 

"My real passion out of the life I described is volunteering," he said. "I'm a staunch supporter of reproductive rights. I don't think it's a black-and-white subject, but I do think it's a far greater evil to tell a woman what she can and cannot do with her own body than it is to stop what would be become a fully functional human from developing." 

At the end of the day, though, Saadah isn't so unusual. He said his biggest concern isn't NASA's latest development, his next ballet performance or his coming lobbying efforts; just like most other students, it's whatever test is looming on the horizon. 

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