00:0035-year-old Waleed is the proud chef and owner of Wal Daun, a restaurant serving authentic
00:22Pakistani food in Cheras. Born deaf, Waleed's love for cooking began
00:32at 13 when he started learning the skill from his mother back in Pakistan.
00:38It's hard to get work when I'm at home, I mean back in Pakistan, and I thought that
00:44perhaps maybe it might be easier to actually get a job here and easy to learn here.
00:51Here in Malaysia, it's very good the way how you can learn and how they teach you.
00:58I told my parents, I left my family, my parents there, and I come here alone.
01:03And I got married to my wife who is from here.
01:09My family stays in Pakistan and they remain there.
01:13In 2019, he married one Nur Arifa who is also deaf after meeting her on Facebook.
01:20While he cooks, she helps manage the restaurant. Although he is now the owner of this spacious
01:27eatery, Waleed first worked at various restaurants across Malaysia.
01:32FMT Lifestyle asked how he communicates with his staff and how he manages the restaurant,
01:38especially since he isn't confident in writing.
01:41When I was in Pahang, I mean the boss, the place that I'm working with, the boss
01:49always reminded me that I have to learn how to write. If I want to buy anything, I have to learn
01:55how to write so that I'll be able to communicate. So it took me about three years approximately
02:00to actually being able to kind of like learn how to write. Yes, I start to pick it up slowly and
02:06like asking people, a customer that come in, do you want a drink? What drink do you want?
02:11Do you want your beverage and all? So they were actually right. So I don't get much communication
02:17writing with the staff, but most of it is like using visual language. I just like show move and
02:25all and it'd be better. Waleed has been operating since November 2024. With just nine Google reviews,
02:33business has been slow but is steadily picking up. Waleed serves a variety of Pakistani dishes
02:40with biryani and naan being crowd favorites. Half of them felt that, wow, it's, you know, it's delicious
02:48and they just look at the menu and they think because there's nothing here that actually showed
02:52that I am deaf. So they don't know I'm deaf. So they say, who's the boss? So and then later on,
02:59when they showed me and they said, oh, he's deaf. So they were going like, the food is
03:04pretty delicious here. So it's a great thing and it's like word of mouth, it spreads around
03:10and people come here. And FMT Lifestyle has to agree, the food is delicious.
03:24To be like the community here, it's like, it's good to actually to portray and show that, you know,
03:31we deaf people could actually have the opportunity to do business on our own.
03:36So this has to be an eye-opener, you know, indirectly. So you can sell like, you know,
03:42from beverages to food and all. So that's why I wanted to show, I'm very happy to
03:47kind of like let people know that, you know, even though I'm deaf, the thing is I could actually
03:52observe the visual language, use my eyes and you know, I can still go on and do business like others
03:57and work. For the full story on Waldaon and more, visit FMT and follow our socials.
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