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Kapitan – Bar Restaurant

Ukrainian model, 21, drops out of NTU to help parents save restaurant from bankruptcy

06 Aug 2023

SOURCE: CNA Lifestyle (Channel NewsAsia)

A CNA Lifestyle feature (sourced from 8days) on Mark Zubovskyy’s decision to put university on hold to run the family restaurant. It mirrors the 8days story: Mark, who grew up in Singapore and served NS, was set to study maritime business at NTU but “couldn’t leave the restaurant” as it lacked manpower asiaone.com asiaone.com . He joined Kapitan full-time weeks before term, taking over operations to ease his parents’ burden. The piece notes Kapitan (opened 2020) had a “nautical-themed facelift” in April 2023 but had struggled for a year with almost no customers cnalifestyle.channelnewsasia.com . Mark leveraged TikTok, creating humorous content (dressed as a ship captain “kidnapping” strangers to dine at Kapitan) which went viral and brought in new patrons straitstimes.com . Still, he acknowledges the challenges of introducing unfamiliar fare (Russian dumplings, borscht, etc.) to Singaporeans straitstimes.com . The article underscores Mark’s resolve to honor his sailor-turned-restaurateur father’s legacy in a different way, and includes Mark’s quote that he has “learned a lot more in the past two years [running a business] than at university” asiaone.com asiaone.com . (This story was published on CNA’s platform, authored by Yip Jieying.)