The Stories Behind: This aspiring pilot was given a year to live at 23. He beat cancer and now aims to fulfil his dream
SINGAPORE — I confronted this question of mortality recently: What would I do if my doctor told me I had a year left to live?
This was while I was at the National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) for an interview and it didn’t take long for me to come up with an answer.
Existing commitments be damned; I would spend the rest of my days traversing the globe and hanging out with my loved ones before the curtain fell — as I imagine any normal person would want to do.
Not so 26-year-old Hansen Hu, it seems, who in his own words said that he was “not normal”.
He was an aviation management student in university when he was diagnosed with a rare soft tissue cancer. His doctors gave him 12 months to live at most.
Yet, the man who sat across from me at NCCS last Monday (Sept 2), four years after his diagnosis, was lively, healthy and disarmingly humorous.
A few days earlier on Aug 31, he had even taken part in the SingHealth Lights Up Lives event to raise money for this year’s President’s Challenge, where his team came in third place for the Fitness Warriors Team Challenge.
“I don’t think I was in denial (over the prognosis), but I didn’t take that one-year timeline into consideration at all,” he told me. “I thought it was (nonsense).”
In September 2020, Mr Hu had several nosebleeds that antibiotics prescribed by doctors did not seem to stop. Shortly after, he noticed a lump the size of “a mini sausage” that grew on the lower left side of his neck.
A surgical biopsy, scan and blood test found that Mr Hu, then aged 23, had stage 4 rhabdomyosarcoma.
Clinical Assistant Professor Tan Ya Hwee said that the five-year survival rate for adult stage 4 rhabdomyosarcoma is "generally less than 20 per cent". The consultant at NCCS's division of medical oncology treated Mr Hu.
Cancer cells had already spread to Mr Hu's spine and hip bone as well.
Although his mother broadly knew of his condition at the time, he had kept quiet about its severity.
The emotional wounds left by the recent passing of his father and grandmother were still fresh, and Mr Hu was not sure if his mum could handle the news of what essentially sounded like another death sentence.
After all, Mr Hu believed that he stood a fighting chance — so much so that he was determined not to let cancer get in the way of any aspect of his daily life.
BUSINESS AS USUAL
Under Asst Prof Tan's advice, Mr Hu underwent 16 rounds of intense chemotherapy and 28 radiotherapy sessions from December 2020 to August 2021.
For every day that he needed treatment, Mr Hu cycled around 1.5km from his home in the Cantonment Road area to NCCS on the grounds of the Singapore General Hospital — and cycled back.
He also went for runs regularly despite experiencing lethargy from chemotherapy.
His choice of location? “Car park rooftops,” he said, smiling.
The streets around his neighbourhood were still quite empty during the Covid-19 pandemic. “So if I end up fainting, people from surrounding flats can see me and call for help.”
Mr Hu did not take a leave of absence from school either. He attended every lecture online and worked on group projects solo, so that his classmates would not have to work extra to cover for him.
I had two questions: How did he manage to keep this up? But more importantly, why?
“It keeps my mind busy, and it prevents me from overthinking or just wasting time by playing games. If I had taken a break from school, I would also lag behind my peers."
He explained that doctors had advised him to stay active as well, because it would improve blood circulation and release chemicals in the brain that would make him feel happier and more cheerful.
“And when I ran, I kept having positive thoughts. I felt like I was Superman, because I’ve gone through all these things, yet I’m still alive today.”
That is not to say that his treatment was child’s play; far from it.
For instance, shortly after completing his radiotherapy treatment, Mr Hu ran a high fever of 41°C for almost a week, and during that period, he barely ate or drank anything.
“I was having hallucinations — aliens were hovering above me and they zapped me sharply every time I did something with my throat,” he recalled with a chuckle.
“Only on the sixth day did I snap out of it: Why were there aliens in my room?”
A persistent question kept surfacing in my mind in the two hours that we spoke. Dealing with cancer is no walk in the park, yet this young man speaks with an air of assurance, as if the experience barely fazed him in the slightest.
I decided I would ask him why and he responded with a cheeky smile.
“You know ‘Joy’ from the movie Inside Out? My ‘Joy’ is quite big; it supersedes all the other characters.”
Then he continued in a slightly more serious tone: “I think there’s no point worrying.
"If you’re a pilot, you’re always in a very high-stress environment, and if you’re panicking at every aspect, then you wouldn’t fly well.
“I watched many pilot videos when I was younger and I think that influenced and shaped how I am.”
CHASING THE CLOUDS
His cancer now in remission, Mr Hu works as an aviation executive at Singapore Airlines, where he manages crew operating patterns according to various fleet and destination requirements.
The work is fine, but it was never his plan to stay rooted on the ground.
When he was a young boy, his grandmother would take him to Changi Airport every week just for fun, and he recalled feeling awestruck wondering how such large majestic structures could take off and glide gently into the skies.
And so Mr Hu made up his mind at the tender age of 11: He would be up there flying the planes himself.
The cancer diagnosis has, however, thrown a large spanner in the works for the man who used to serve as a pilot trainee in the Republic of Singapore Air Force, with a diploma in aviation engineering and a degree in aviation management.
He said that the chances of doctors clearing him to obtain a pilot's licence are not great.
Rhabdomyosarcoma is a rare form of cancer. Asst Prof Tan said that NCCS sees an average of fewer than five new cases a year.
Therefore, there are not many studies that can attest that his ability to fly will not be compromised, even after he has been cancer-free.
Still, as always, that will not stop Mr Hu from trying.
“I’ve never seen myself doing an office job my whole life. I still want to be a pilot and nothing else — you’re still seated, but it’s way more interesting," he said.
“You’re operating a highly complex machine, you’re looking at the skies and no one cloud is the same."
Speaking to Asst Prof Tan about Mr Hu's journey to recovery, she told me that Mr Hu had shown a "remarkable maturity beyond his years", even at the time of diagnosis.
"Faced with a life-changing diagnosis at a young age, he has taken it in his stride and handled it with resilience," she said.
Indeed, that hardy and jovial aspect of Mr Hu's personality shines through within moments of getting to know the man.
And if the calm, measured and confident manner with which he has navigated and overcome his cancer diagnosis is anything to go by, I’d wager that he will be up there manoeuvring an aircraft in the clouds sooner rather than later.