Pod#144 - Hamza Gulzar aka Boy Bawarchi - Food, Faith, Family & Identity

Hamza's BoyBawarchi account is a TikTok and Twitter sensation. You know him from his extremely calming, almost serene, baking videos on the platforms. Just Hamza and his baking, and a visual aesthetic that brings an almost meditative vibe to his videos.    That's what I thought I'd be talking to him about, how he makes his videos, difficult baking experiments and the like. Where the conversation went pretty much immediately however, was a place that was far more emotional and deep than I expected.    Things discussed in this episode:   00:00 Intro  02:38 Growing up in Pakistan and the US, adjusting to the moves  05:49 How he got into baking in college  14:11 How he developed his video aesthetic  19:12 Why do people like his videos? What he thinks, what people say  28:50 The deeper, spiritual connections to be found in food and living life with intentionality  34:00 How does he decide what to make? Channeling his identity through the recipes he chooses  41:23 A turbulent but revelatory trip to Pakistan, just as he went all-in on baking  58:00 Our complicated emotional relationships with Pakistan  1:02:55 Business plans, going to Pakistan to collab and learn local recipes  1:07:34 Feelings of solitude, finding a community in the US, thinking about legacy & belonging  1:22:45 Being from two places, why he might want to move to Pakistan, it’s okay to want to be happy  1:30:40 How he wants to connect his faith to his work, Chef’s Table  1:36:10 Shoutouts and outro   LINKS:  His TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@boybawarchi His Twitter: https://twitter.com/boybawarchi His Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/boybawarchi/ His YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3RE-jX9J9Pj26NQM5q-XCw/about  --------------------------------------------------------------------------------  Thanks to our sponsor Manscaped - Check out the Performance Package 4.0 at https://Manscaped.com and use our offer code! * Get 20% off + free shipping with the code TPR at manscaped.com.   * That’s 20% off + free shipping with the code TPR at manscaped.com.   Support the podcast by becoming a monthly patron on Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/tprpod) or send a one-off token on Ko-fi (https://ko-fi.com/tprpod)!   Find all our previous episodes on SoundCloud, Spotify & Apple Podcasts and follow us all on Twitter! Links to everything below!  SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/tprpodSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6PvTahp... Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tprpod/Twitter: https://twitter.com/TPRPod Ali: https://twitter.com/themaholupperRizwan: https://twitter.com/RizwanTakkharSarkhail: https://twitter.com/Sarkhail7Khan