An engineer, break-dancer and a nomad

Nadir Hossain's resume indicates just how much the job sector has changed abroad. Nadir didn’t add his school grades, CGPA and proficiencies in different fields to his curriculum vitae (CV) but only a story that he terms his ‘timeline’.

In that timeline, Nadir, a Bangladeshi-American youth, has highlighted significant moments of his life by attaching small pictures accompanied with a sentence of eight to ten lines.

His timeline has the tale of being beaten up at school at early age for his ‘weird’ name. It describes his struggle to lose 40 pounds in weight at a stage of his life in order to stay fit.

Also part of his timeline is how he got involved in various construction projects and gathered experience after his graduation in mechanical engineering from the University of California San Diego (UCSD) in USA.

If you take a look at the timeline, you will know that Nadir once wanted to be a doctor and has a penchant for breakdance. And now he is working as the special operations lead of the famous electric car manufacturer Tesla.

While many feel bored and struggle to cope with working from home during Covid-19 pandemic, he invented a new concept— ‘work from van’.

Nadir simply emptied a 12-seat Mercedes Sprinter van and designed a small room there with cooking and Wi-Fi facilities. Traveling around the country amid the pandemic is the biggest advantage of this home.

In an interview aired on Zoom, the Bangladeshi-American told Prothom Alo that “I can open the door and stand up right there to inhale fresh air and to observe beautiful landscape in the middle of sending two e-mails. If I don’t want the same scene, I can move my van to somewhere else. It’s like a check-in and check-out without any hassle”

Nadir Hossain might have been a physician had he not fainted while watching surgery as part of a premedical course. Had Nadir not lost consciousness on that day, at the end of his graduation he might have been worked in a hospital, not in the construction company, ‘QA Construction’.

QA Construction greatly influenced Nadir's life as he gained some crucial experience from this company. He was involved in the construction of the largest world’s floating bridge, the SR 520 Bridge, USA.

The engineer said, “I had to travel to Seattle for my work. No one knew me there. I was then a young man from Los Angeles in fitting trousers, while all of my colleagues in that city were big-built white men who chewed tobacco."

Adapting to a different culture, Nadir realised that one has to create one's own identity. He started visiting different concerts and interacting with people to overcome his loneliness in Seattle.

After work, Nadir used to teach breakdance to the underprivileged children. He said, “I have taken up all sorts of jobs in my life. Most of them are voluntary service.”

The 31-year-old engineer always wants to use the positive energy of youth. At a stage of the conversation, he said, "I am worried that nothing new has happened in my life in the last one week!"

Nadir was shocked when he went to Tesla's headquarter in San Francisco for the first time. The office was spacious without any wall inside.

In Nadir’s words, “About 500 employees work together in that office. It's very exciting.”

He joined in Tesla in 2018.

Talking about his responsibility in Elon Musk's company, Nadir Said, “Most of the electric cars in the United States are made by Tesla. But the problem is that charging stations are not as accessible as gas or oil stations. Apart from this, it takes 20 to 30 minutes to charge a car so vehicles have to wait in long queue at the charging stations. My job is to resolve the problem.”

Nadir also spoke about a surprising project. Tesla has built a mobile charging station. A large battery set on a truck by which eight cars can be charged simultaneously.

Nadir said, “This battery can supply electricity to three buildings the size of Bashundhara shopping mall”.

Nadir Hossain last visited to Bangladesh in 2016. His father Tofazzal Hossain and mother Shahida Hossain are from Cumilla. They migrated to the United States before Nadir was born.

When asked about what he likes in Bangladesh the most, Nadir said, “Thanks to my cousins, I have met many youth in Bangladesh. I am fascinated by their creativity and talent. Bangladesh went through a lot of struggle in the seventies and eighties. Most of those who are taking the country forward now are young. There are very few such countries in the world.”

*This report, originally published in Prothom Alo print edition, has been rewritten in English by NH Sajjad.