![\"Ashish](\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/theme\/images\/th-online\/1x1_spacer.png\" "\\"Ashish")
<\/picture><\/div>\nAshish Vidyarthi talks about how GoPro and he discovered each other during one of the phases of the pandemic and how they embarked on a journey of telling stories together. It made him look at people more closely, and the stories started happening. Today, the National Award winning actor has 1.93 million subscribers on his YouTube channel, Actor Ashish Vidyarthi Vlogs and 1.5 million followers on his Instagram handle.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
Ashish was in Kerala as part of Raining Smiles, his \u2018project\u2019 following the monsoon and spreading smiles or rather laughs as he performs stand-up comedy across the length and breadth of the country. As part of it, he will perform impromptu gigs in cafes and restaurants. He started at Kanyakumari, before moving to Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam and Kochi. As a stand-up comic, he has performed Sit Down Ashish across the country, the most recent being at the Habitat, Mumbai and Black Cat, Kolkata.<\/p>\n
While Sit Down Ashish is, as he calls, \u2018the formal thing\u2019, Raining Smiles is informal, unrehearsed and organic. As part of it, \u201cI will come to a place where performances are not usually held. I will meet people and perform as well.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He is exactly like how he is on his vlogs \u2014 warm and friendly. There is an unhurried air about him, as he settles down for a conversation. His wife, Rupali has been travelling with him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The actor who won the National Award for the Best Supporting actor for his role in Drohkaal,<\/i> handles mainstream and arthouse films with equal ease. The Malayali audience last saw him in a cameo in Aavesham.<\/i> That balancing his multiple roles is not hard for him is evident from how he speaks about them. He enjoys crisscrossing the country, constant travel\u2026 \u201cI go to bed completely tired, I like to go to bed tired rather than bored. And I am not bored!\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \nAshish Vidyarthi <\/div>\n His vlogs, posted on IG and YouTube, cover food too. Before the food content, he posted interviews with little-known but extraordinary people.\u00a0<\/p>\n Of how he got into creating content, he says, \u201cIt was an interesting period of my life when I was going through stuff. It is said that the more you keep looking at yourself, the more you get depressed. Things don\u2019t go according to plan and this [vlogging] too was not planned.\u201d At the time, he confessed, he did not know much about vlogging though he had been blogging.<\/p>\n Vlogging helped him deal with the difficult times, \u201cit was therapeutic,\u201d he adds.\u00a0<\/p>\n The food stories which have him explore little-known food places with locals are especially popular. He remembers his first food Reel, one of him eating vada pav in Mumbai shot by a colleague. He is candid about the numbers initially on YouTube and IG \u2014 \u201cI had zero subscribers on YouTube and around 20,000 on IG.\u201d The current figures speak volumes about his popularity as a vlogger\/content creator.\u00a0<\/p>\n This \u2018new\u2019 role is not by, what he calls, \u2018purposeful design\u2019. \u201cI am combining my two loves \u2014 travelling and eating. I am expressing myself in ways beyond what I am expected to as an actor.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n In another avatar he is a motivational speaker, he has been one for the past 13 years for which he travels regularly. \u201cThat was my first new avatar\u2026the vlogging part is new. And stand-up comic is the newest. For me, it is an extension of who I am. The material comes from my life, I can laugh at myself\u2026 which is again therapeutic,\u201d says the 58 year old. Ashish another YouTube channel, Fifty Plus Zindagi and a podcast, the Ashish Vidyarthi Podcast.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The films are happening alongside, but he picks and chooses them. With 350-odd films in 11 languages, he has earned that privilege as an actor. \u201cSo, I\u2019m looking for those amazing roles and when I say amazing I mean one that is central to the film. As an actor, it is interesting to wait for things to happen.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n His packed schedule begs the question about how he makes the time for everything?\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI have time for everything because I wake up very early. On the days I have a shoot, I record my vlogs before and after it!\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"Ashish](\"https:\/\/th-i.thgim.com\/public\/incoming\/gfvnnt\/article68311187.ece\/alternates\/FREE_1200\/kimp_AV2.jpg\" "\\"Ashish")
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