Prominent food vlogger Iftekhar Rafsan, better known as Rafsan the ChotoBhai, has again hit the headlines as he visits YouTube's Asia Pacific headquarters in Singapore as the first Bangladeshi content creator to be invited.
Sharing a photo of him holding a handcrafted Bangladeshi flag made of jamdani fabric, which Unesco recognizes as a cultural heritage of the country, Rafsan expressed his gratitude for the invitation and the tour in a heartfelt Facebook post on Thursday.
He called the YouTube's office "one of the most beautiful and craziest" he had ever seen.
The Jamdani sari was registered as the first Bangladeshi GI product in 2016. It is the fifth edition of Bangalee's traditional product, muslin.
The term Jamdani is Persian, derived from “Jam”, meaning flower, and “Dani”, as in a vase or a container, named after decorative floral patterns found on Dhakai textile. During Mughal rule, there were handlooms in almost all villages in Dhaka district. Dhaka, Sonargaon, Dhamrai, Titabari, Jangalbari, and Bajitpur were famous for making superior-quality jamdani.
Moreover, the 2013 Unesco Conference of the “Intergovernmental Committee for Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage” declared Jamdani handicraft the “sole tradition” and “intangible cultural heritage” of Bangladesh.
Last year, YouTube, in a post on Instagram, recognized Rafsan as a versatile content creator representing Bangladesh.
He was given the best content creator award in the food and recipe category of the second edition of Blender's Choice—The Daily Star OTT and Digital Content Awards. He got the award for reviewing the world's most expensive steak in Malaysia.
As a show of his entrepreneurial skills, Rafsan engaged in the restaurant business and launched his own brand—an electrolyte drink called BLU—in December last year. The drink is available in two flavours—watermelon lemonade and lychee.
Rafsan started making content for his YouTube channel in 2017 and now has over 2.19 million subscribers. Rafsan, a computer science graduate, has over 4 million followers on Facebook. Content-making is now his profession.
Apart from food reviews, he is engaged in brand promotion, travel vlogging, modelling, and acting in TV ramas. Because of his passion for gaming, Rafsan has participated in various tournaments online since 2011. He also went outside the country to play tournaments.
From YouTube’s Singapore headquarters on Thursday, Rafsan went on to acknowledge YouTube's support for creators and declared his achievement a collective victory for Bangladesh, saying: "This is not my win; this is our win."
He also thanked his followers for allowing him to represent his country, calling the experience "like a dream."
Speaking to the media, Rafsan recently said he started creating content for YouTube in 2017, though the channel had been created in 2014. Initially, he made three videos that year and became regular after a two-year break.
“I hear a lot of vloggers do paid reviews, where they don't really express their opinion about the food or product. I never did that. I call bad things bad, and I call good things good. Maybe the audience understood this mentality of mine,” he said.