An Interview With The 1st Youtuber Of Junagadh

We often hear people saying not to leave job until you find another, don't leave a job for a freelancing work, etc. People often say this to those who have done engineering or management or any other such qualification. They are often criticised for doing something like self employment or entrepreneurship or something that yields no fixed income. However, the major issue occurs when people think of doing something like acting, singing, photography, videography, writing, etc. Parents, Relatives, Society, Neighbours everyone has only one statement to say: What is the Future? What is the guarantee of income? Being a writer I have never heard people saying “live a satisfied life”. Everyone talks about “A Successful Life”. I have touched this topic even in Why Always the Same Story? where the only focus is on money and not on happiness. 

Today, I have come up with one such story of a girl who is daily fighting with such society and trying to live a satisfying and a happy life instead of a successful monotonous life. 

Recently I came across an Instagram handle named “Cooking House” which is owned by “Megha Sachdev”. When I went through the profile and posts, I realised that this is someone from my hometown Junagadh which still lacks behind in the productive usage of Internet. I found it quite surprising and happy. Because for the first time I saw someone making money through their content in my city. My curiosity could not resist me from knowing more. So I connected with her and asked many questions.

• Tell us about you aka Megha

I am a Computer Engineer as per my educational qualification. I have served as a professor for about 2 years at Amrut Institute and had been the Head of Department there.

Now, I am a Youtuber where starting from cooking till the editing of the videos that I shoo, everything is done by me. 

• What is your Hobby?

Without any doubt, Cooking.

• Who is your Inspiration?

My all time back bone has been my mother, Mrs. Usha Sachdev who not only guides me in cooking but also teaches me to face all types of criticisms.

• What is the Foundation of your youtube journey? How did you begin with it?

I have been observing my mother cooking in the kitchen for the family since childhood. This created an interest in me to experiment with the food and I started cooking. I began sharing my recipes in the written format with a Facebook group called “Rasoi Ni Rani”. My recipes were acknowledged and tried by several others in the group. This caught the eye of the group admin who later called and asked me to share 1-2 paid recipes every week in the group in a specific format and this worked as the foundation for my recipe sharing ideas on youtube.

• About Cooking House

Cooking House is a food recipe channel on Youtube where I share my recipes everyday. I began this channel about a year ago with the advice of a well wisher. Being a computer engineer, I hardly knew anything about Videography and the Video Marketing. So I took the help of my cousins, Dharika Pabari & Navdha Samani who also run their own YouTube Channel and began with my youtube journey a year ago. Today, I have 1 million  Subscribers. I feel proud to say that my one cousin being from MSC and the other a doctor, they are amazing at YouTube.

• Her love towards cooking

Cooking definitely is my passion because no one would leave a fixed pay giving job for a youtube channel. But I had not only left my job 4-5 months back but I have also faced and fought against a lot of criticism for leaving my job which was not as satisfying my inner self as compared to cooking. I had to share recipes to FB Group as well on youtube where I was the only one to cook, to shoot, to edit and to promote along with the fixed pay giving job. So I left the job to devote all my time to cooking and love my inner self through the same.

• How do you face the criticism?

There are many people who criticise me for leaving my job and doing nothing but cooking. There are a few fix number of dislikes on my videos as well. I consider all of it an inspiration because looking at the number of dislikes right after I upload a video only proves that there are some who actually wait for my videos irrespective of their hatred towards my work. So, for me criticism is actually a motivation to cook more and to shoot more.

• Tell us about every ladder of your cooking life

I have participated in competitions like Kitchen Premier League, Rajkot; Cooking Competition, Rajkot; Open Gujarat Competition - Chef of Gujarat where I was able to acquire a place in the Top 20 out of 400 participants and was able to meet the Master Chefs of India like Ripu Daman and Pankaj.

I also have a dedicated episode on Flavours of Gujarat which has been telecasted on Colors Gujarati and is also available on the internet.

I was also honoured by Raghuvanshi Sakhi Sahiyar Vrund held by Lohana Caste.

• What are your future goals?

My present short term goal is to receive the Silver Play button from Youtube by touching 1 million subscribers. My Long term Goal is to have my own cooking studio where I can invite other homemakers from all across Gujarat as a chef and shoot their recipes.

• What strategies have you made to achieve those goals?

Increasing the reach on Youtube is the most challenging task because one can get views by sharing the links to people but converting them into subscribers is really difficult. So to get more involvement into my channel, I am planning to host competitions on my channel where I will invite participants to share their recipes and will reward the winners with some giveaways. This will encourage others to do something and will help me to get more subcribers. 

Also presently I am highly active on Facebook so soon I will use Instagram to increase my reach.

• Any message you would like to give our Readers?

Being a Youtuber can be as easy as other jobs if everyone will acknowledge the work of an Youtuber. I only have one question to all “Why is a Youtuber not Valued?” 

Also being from a small town, I often see people ignoring the importance of the technology by saying, “What can we do sitting in junagadh? This is a small town, you can do nothing here.” So I just want to say that today nothing is impossible. Whether you belong to metro or to a village, if you know the right way to use things, you can do anything from anywhere.

Social media profiles

YouTube: Cooking House

Facebook: Cooking House

Instagram:  Cooking House

I believe Megha is really an inspiration for people who still hesitate to leave their jobs to pursue their passion. It is very important for everyone to get out of their comfort zones and have the courage to do something that they love ignoring the thought that what will people say? 

I wish Megha a hearty goodluck for all her future goals and I hope that soon I’ll be able to visit her cooking studio and interview some of her clients along with her.

Don't forget to read other blog posts Neha Garg