Davy Dallas “DADA” Peng

The idea of founding an initiative for young dying people had been floating around in DADA PENG’s head for years, but how?

In 2020, DADA PENG celebrated his twentieth hospice anniversary. That is, in 2000 he entered a hospice for the first time and began his active time as a volunteer there. Shortly before, his father had died of cancer and he had accompanied him within the family at home. His first unconscious death care, so to speak. After his father’s death, however, it was very difficult to talk about what he had experienced. DADA PENG wanted to talk about it, but nobody wanted to hear it. At that time he was working for the german TV Channel KIKA as a presenter for the TigerentenClub and his “normal” life had nothing to do with the topic of death and dying. In the hospice, he found people who listened. Hospice staff and relatives who understood how he was feeling. Dada then trained to be a companion for the dying and worked in the hospice for a total of three years as a volunteer, in addition to his job in front of the camera. This was followed by a number of difficult years in which someone from his family or close circle of friends died almost every two years. Most recently, in 2011, his mother, also of cancer.

“In the times of grief, I wrote. Lyrics, songs, poems. From some of them my first book “mein buch vom leben und sterben” (my book about living and dying) was created, with which I then in turn conducted a total of 150 concert readings over the years in cooperation with more than 100 hospice associations. So I got a very good and extensive insight into the “hospice scene” and I noticed that there are wonderful offers for old people and children, but hardly enough offers on- and offlline for the current generation and young people. So the desire rose in me to found an initiative that takes care of exactly such offers, empowers dying people and emancipates them. That’s how the idea of superheroes was born.”

After very quickly dismissing the idea of founding an association of DADA PENG, he decided in 2020 to give himself the initiative for the hospice anniversary. He simply founded it, over drinks with his two closest friends. Initially over a period of months as a OneManShow and to date over 90% privately funded. In the meantime, Dada Peng has founded the non-profit “Superhelden fliegen vor gUG”, which is based in Berlin, of which he is also the CEO.

“2021 was super exciting! I realized right away that many people were really waiting for us and that our initiative was really needed. Then came such wonderful collaborations as the one with yeswecan!cer and our social media reach exploded virtually overnight. SUPERHELDEN is now a non-profit startup. Now we have a solid framework, we can find new collaborations and partners and implement our projects in a very concrete way.”

On Feb. 14, 2022, DADA PENG’s third book in german language, “Knockin’on Jimmy’s Door – How We Live Happier When We Learn to Die,” was also published by HERDER Verlag.
In this book, he explains in detail what changes he would like to see within our society with the topic of death and dying, what his vision of a Hospice 4.0 looks like and further shows what very personal relationship connects him with death, or as he calls him “Jimmy”.

More on Dada Peng´s work in english you can find on his personal english website:

www.davydallaspeng.com