Globe and Mail, Canada
April 29 2006
‘Like coming to my house’
At a tiny Beaches restaurant, hospitality, Armenian-style, knows no
bounds
IAN HARVEY
Special to The Globe and Mail
It’s Saturday night in the Beaches and Raffi Asparian is in full
stride.
“Here,” he says to a couple seated in his tiny Queen Street East
storefront restaurant, Arax, which is named after the Armenian river.
“Try this. It’s good.”
He offers one of the diners a morsel of sausage from the plate he’s
carrying, then sweeps off to set the plate down at another table in
front of the guest who had ordered it.
“You need more from the bar. You help yourself. I’m busy,” he
suggests to another thirsty customer.
It’s Mr. Asparian’s way. He’s just as likely to pull up a chair and
join you as he is to help himself to a glass of wine from your table
or extend an invitation to dance — all the while maintaining a
staccato stream of cordial conversation about life, love and
business. And that’s just during his evening shift. Fired with
restless energy, the gregarious restaurateur also owns and runs Jewel
on the Beach, a jewellery store across the street, where he begins
his workday at noon, closing up at 5 p.m. to open the restaurant.
All of this he’s been doing single-handedly, from running the
jewellery business to greeting, cooking and serving the
Mediterranean-influenced food at his 26-seat eatery.
But after years of juggling two jobs, that crazy Armenian guy, as
he’s more familiarly known in the neighbourhood, is finally taking a
break. Next month, he’ll turn the jewellery store over to son Jacob,
22. Which will leave Mr. Asparian free to finally enjoy a few
afternoons off.
“I don’t want my kids to work in the [restaurant] business,” he says.
“It’s too hard. It takes you away from your family.
“I want them to have a normal life.”
Still, it’s clear to most customers that Mr. Asparian, a fixture on
the strip for 14 years, enjoys the restaurant business. And the
lifestyle appears to suit him.
While he posts official hours for the restaurant, he often decides
when he has had enough for the night, and sometimes leaves his diners
to close up.
“He’s actually slowed down, believe it or not,” notes Charles
Farrugia, president of Datacom and a regular from the days when Mr.
Asparian’s family ran a restaurant at Avenue Road and Eglinton.
“[Arax] is not really a restaurant as much as a tourist attraction. I
love to bring people there. My parents, even, they love him.
“He has this incredible recollection and treats people like he’s
known them all his life. He loves to interact.”
“I survive because of my customers,” says Mr. Asparian, who is 52.
“They keep me in business. When they eat at my restaurant, it’s like
coming to my house.”
Whether at the store or the restaurant, he greets customers as if he
knows them, and banters brusquely, in the way old friends josh and
chide each other.
“I thought he was drunk or crazy,” says Margaret Czaja, recalling how
she met him 12 years ago when she dropped by for drinks after
finishing her shift at a Polish restaurant. “He sat down, grabbed my
wine and drank it. Then he brings another round for the table, and
the next day he sent flowers.”
It was the start of what turned out to be a long-term friendship.
Armenian by way of Lebanon, Mr. Asparian’s family opened the first
incarnation of Arax in 1975 when they arrived in Canada. The food was
much as it is today, a mix of Mediterranean, along with more Middle
Eastern Armenian dishes. Over the years, the business migrated to
different locations, some big, some smaller, at Bathurst and
Lawrence, Warden and Lawrence, and finally the Beaches.
“What a country Canada is,” he says, repeating the classic
immigrant’s mantra. “You work hard and you have success. Don’t tell
me you can’t get a job. I have two.”
But from now on, he’ll have just one, and regular diners at Arax are
glad he’s chosen to stick with the restaurant gig.
“If I did some of the things he’s done, I’d be in jail,” laughs Steve
Ferguson, who has followed Mr. Asparian across the city for 30 years.
“He gets away with it, though. It’s always a party and fun.”