Chinese internet star Li Ziqi sets Guinness World Record for YouTube subscribers with rural lifestyle show
- Li’s videos show her in rural Sichuan, doing farm chores, growing and gathering food, and cooking it
- Her videos have gained almost three million subscribers since July, and she set off the recent kimchi storm
Chinese internet culinary sensation Li Ziqi has set a record for “Most subscribers for a Chinese-language channel on YouTube”, Guinness World Records announced on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like service on Tuesday night.
She was listed in the records in July with 11.4 million subscribers and had gone up to 14.1 million by the end of January, the post said.
“The poetic and idyllic lifestyle and the exquisite traditional Chinese culture shown in Li’s videos have attracted fans from all over the world, with many YouTubers commenting in praise,” the post said. “The culture that her videos conveyed is travelling further.”
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Chinese online star Li Ziqi provides an escape from urban life
Chinese netizens reacted with praise, with a related hashtag on Weibo being read over 720 million times by Wednesday morning.
“Li definitely made Westerners understand Chinese culture better, she has done a great job exerting soft power,” one comment said.
“When I watched her videos, I felt calm, quiet, beautiful. In her videos, I could hear birds chirping, that’s the sound of nature,” another said.
