Ode to Nurhachi, Dim Sum King!
One of the foremost allures of dining at the Dim Sum King Seafood Restaurant in Toronto’s Chinatown is a chance to behold the restaurant’s handsome aged busboy. On a recent visit, I was able to relive a childhood fixation.
He was a short, strapping fellow who I called ‘Nurhachi’ or sometimes ‘The Jurchen’ in my head on account of his resemblance to the progenitor of the Qing. He must now be over seventy years old, but he moved with the deliverance and grace of someone a quarter of his age.
This was not the place for deliberate and graceful movement. Everywhere was bustle. The restaurant was utterly spasmodic. High-pitched clinks of plastic chopstick on shitty porcelain contrasted with low rumbles of the bad wheel on a serving cart, rattling its contents with every spin. English conversation spread across the room at a dull hum, punctuated by sharp blasts of Cantonese as the waitstaff spoke amongst themselves.
The place may once have been a lower-quality conference venue, a fact that layers of Cantonese decorations could not conceal. On the contrary, the red paper lanterns and engraved fountain at the foyer doors rather contributed to the somewhat shoddy atmosphere. In front of this fountain, just after entering the restaurant, were literally hundreds of framed photographs of the restaurant’s owners posing with celebrity patrons, from senior cabinet members to local rappers.
Possibly on account of the long-standing alliance between North America’s Jewish and Chinese communities, commemorated each year on Christmas Eve, Dim Sum King’s most loyal patrons seemed to be West-End Toronto Jewish families. But really, you have hardly seen a more diverse crowd. People of every caste and creed frequented the place. It would not be an understatement to call the restaurant a veritable institution.
(A reputation which was far from unfounded! Despite the ambiance of shabbiness, Dim Sum King is truly good eating, and, provided one knows how to order, legitimately affordable.)
But food aside, the real joy for me was a chance to watch Nurhachi.
He was amazingly fast for his calm demeanor, and I used to wonder if his heart rate ever rose above sixty BPM; you would not know if it did. Watching him work was mesmerizing. He cut and wove between serving carts and crowded tables without stooping or turning his body, even when his hands were filled with several bins of dirty dishes. All of this on a diet of, I imagine, congee and cigarettes.
On one occasion, I was transfixed as he carried a high-chair out of the kitchen to accommodate a large group with many children. He held the wooden chair high above his head as if it were made of feathers.
Nurhachi was a singularly beautiful man with a sharp face. He had high cheekbones, small eyes, large ears, and a pointed chin. His salt-and-pepper gray hair was often covered with a ball cap, and his nose was long and very straight. And although his expression was perennially serious, he maintained a slight warmth that always intrigued me. As if he might know some very funny off-colour jokes.
I’d noticed him since I was old enough to notice, meaning he must have worked there for at least two decades. And considering the restaurant’s hours – 9:00 in the morning until 10:00 in the evening, seven days a week – he might have spent more time working there than I spent in the waking world those twenty years. I never once dined there and failed to spot him.
This was especially apparent in contrast with the restaurant’s other staff, like a shuffling middle-aged server who used far too much Brylcreem on far too little hair. Or a chipper gentleman in a very cheap suit who always handled the bill; he would claim to recognize you with a “long time no see,” but with the number of customers through their doors each day, this was doubtful. I expect this little pleasantry did not hurt his tip. Or the youngest of the front-of-house workers, a flabby man with a single silver hoop. He was simultaneously completely ineffectual and astonishingly rude.
No, Nurhachi was above them all. He floated about the restaurant floor with a certain dignity that invokes royalty; an esteemed aristocrat, perhaps, or a career diplomat. I’ve often caught myself wondering if the ‘King’ in the restaurant’s name didn’t refer secretly to him, and if its noisy, oily, delicious daily operations were not in fact part of his heavenly mandate.
He could have been chiseled out of stone. And in some regards, he may well have been – in twenty years of observing him, I never saw him speak a word.
