THERE are many ways to live one's life but to live it passionately will guarantee you an enjoyable ride.
From an ordinary kid fantasizing of Japanese anime, 43-year-old chef Dana Zapanta has made it big in the food industry after putting up Kaizen, a Japanese-street dining in Davao City.
The restaurant will celebrate its first anniversary in less than a month now but since they opened to public, the number of customers coming in has continued to flourish.
Chef Dana has spent 25 years abroad learning and perfecting his skills in the kitchen. Thus, everything from their menu will taste just as good as any customer would want because it's a product of love and dedication. Apart from their delicious food, another thing that makes a Kaizen-dining-experience different from the others is the way the staff's positive vibe welcomes you as you enter the place. Chef Dana would say that the secret to his success is being grateful to the people who work with him and nurturing them as well.
"Everything that I have learned in the past, I want to share to others, those people who I work with. It has become my advocacy to help others become better versions of themselves so they would feel great. And if they feel great about themselves, they would function at their best," he said.
And just like every other dreamers, Chef Dana also went through a lot of challenges before he became the man he is today. As a Filipino working abroad (in Japan and USA), it's given that you would have to work and compete with a lot of men from different races, stereotype and discrimination always come with it.
"My passion for work is bigger than their judgments and so I continued with my craft until they saw how good I am," he said.
Now that he is on his way to put up another one-of-a-kind experience for the Dabawenyos to enjoy, he shares to the world that the secret recipe to making it big in the industry is to, "believe and follow your intuition with love and respect to yourself and others."