My World: When you Youtube your home town

I did it the other night and was staggered by what I found.

I’ve got to say the resulting hours I spent watching videos was like travelling back in time to an area very much represented by the people at that time.

Right, I’ll let you in on what I found when I typed in my town on Youtube.

Try to make your search as local as possible, so instead of typing in ‘Rotherham’ I actually typed in ‘Rawmarsh’, the area I originate from.

The results that popped up were VERY interesting, for a number of reasons.

For one, you get to view the area you grew up in through the eyes of a complete stranger, someone who has stumbled upon these videos by accident or has been led there by other videos.

Secondly, it gives you a great insight into the people from the area – some you know and some you don’t – but it gives you an idea.

When I went ahead and typed Rawmarsh in the search bar I was sat at home on my laptop. The first video that popped up was called ‘Rawmarsh crew’ and had a number of youngsters in baseball caps Berghaus waterproofs making gun signs with their fingers to the camera.

After watching (and laughing) for a few minutes at the slideshow of pictures, it dawned on me that I actually knew the people in the video.

I went to school with a large proportion of them in fact, but at first glance I didn’t recognise any of them.

One of them was in my form class but it took me a while to twig on, because I’d simply forgotten about her.

I’d also forgotten about the clothes, the music and the extremely poor quality of camera phones in the mid 2000s, although all the memories came flooding back in seconds.

After I’d watched this video, I went back to the Rawmarsh search and ultimately spent hours going through videos of the area I grew up in.

Even if the people in the videos weren’t familiar to me, the places are and I can relate to the things that are done there.

Rawmarsh skate park crops up a few times, the school has some promo videos and the pubs have footage of their regulars.

It truly was a trip down memory lane, making me think about people and places I haven’t thought about for so many years – and even try to make contact with one or two of them.

The reason I enjoyed it so much is because (in my opinion) places are all about the people who reside in them and that’s what makes them come to life.

If anyone who reads this decides to Youtube the place they grew up, I’m sure they will – just like me – sit for hours glued to their computer screens remembering, reminiscing and ultimately reliving.

Comment below to let me know what great videos you found!