A universal truth that has been well established is that white light splits into its seven constituent colors upon passing through a prism, planets break down to form moons upon impact, glass fragments into tiny shards when it cracks, roads meet at crossroads only to split further.
A mere fact that can be drawn out of this is that all of these above individual entities possess a unique core that makes them up and that splitting up that core does not necessarily collapse them, rather it does enhance them at times – light splits up to paint the sky in myriad colors, moons shine to bliss of the night, shards of glass shine more lustrously than as a whole, roads split only to connect more places.
The point that I am trying to proves correlates deeply to the story of my life and the ray of hope that Google Maps’ Local guides platform enshrined upon me. Indeed, it is a true, heart-etched story.
Philosophizing back from the previous paragraph, life too is made of countless individual moments. A person, is neither made nor should be broken by just one single of these moments.
But I hadn’t learnt this lesson when life hit me at its hardest.
It was one of these vivid teenage years, when instead of going out and greeting the world, I used to lean back on a chair, surrounded by nothing but purple-painted walls caparisoned with a dozen or so paintings that stretched from one corner to another, surrounded by heaps of video games and half-eaten potato chips wrappers. Never did I realize back then on what was I missing upon.
Isolation dragged me into a gaming addiction which pulled me further into a cesspool of frustration and dependence on virtual gaming wins as the reason for my smiles. Life did not take this kindly. I was swiftly sucked into having anxiety and obesity. Diseases followed me like flies upon a pie. Things became a mud-hole and I was desperately trying to pull my legs out, my eyes scouring for a ray of hope.
A year passed. Things stayed the same. But something came in.
Once, I was walking down one of these narrow streets of my city that intertwine into each other like grapes in a grapevine. This city of Cuttack, India, being a thousand years old is bound to be filled with heritage and history and there was this window, easily centuries old, that caught my eye.
It was an intricately embroidered mahogany window lined up with Morning Glory flowers. I went ahead to capture it on my mobile only to discover a surprisingly well-preserved pond, dotted with artistic and antique stone carvings. It was love at first sight and my life was about to change forever.
I opened Google Maps to pinpoint my location and to my extreme surprise, that place was hardly a half- kilometre away from my home! I was shell-shocked to know that I used to walk up and down these streets for more than a decade of my life and yet I was so preoccupied with empty thoughts and unnecessary talks that I had never bothered to bat an eye over here.
I named this place – “Paradise Lake” and added it to Google Maps along with a ‘detailed’ review and about a dozen photos. I have quoted detailed to emphasize that given how lazy I was, writing more than 200 characters was indeed a very big deal!
Within a week, more than a 100 people had seen this place and liked my review and I liked this new found ‘fandom.’ Not much later, I joined a cycling group that took me places – offbeat, off-road, lush-green, deep-city and what not. As the number of miles that I pedaled grew, so did my content on Google Maps. I scoured Forums, learnt how to write reviews, interacted and met people, got back in good health, tasted delicacies at places I never knew existed, memorized half the atlas, traveled to more than six cities, explored the length and breadth and every nook and cranny of my city, photographed enough to fill up my phone’s storage and what not. But most importantly, I did become an avid Local Guide.
The thrust to help people, to put my city on the map, to add and let people know that just how many offbeat spots lie at a stone’s throw away from the city, edit out the wrong and spam that filled in the map, let important establishments such as schools, hospitals and government offices be checked in with the right details, know about the culture and traditions of other places from the myriad photos posted by fellow Guides. All in all, the major cause that drives me to be a Local Guide is the simple fact that how effortlessly our one edit or contribution can help somebody else so magnanimously and that a gesture as simple as showing the right direction can have such a huge impact on the global community.
Local Guides taught me to see through the broken end of the spectrum of my life and feel in the kaleidoscope of colors that I was oblivious to. It gave me a platform and a healthy community to indulge in and made me literally be at home. It was a new lease of life, almost a rebirth and it will ever be insurmountable thankfulness that I am indebted to Google Maps and Local Guides.
I would love to spread this happiness to others and thus, my major goal at Google Maps is to let people be at these offbeat places, relax at nature’s lap, rejuvenate and let their hectic lifestyle, dull charisma gets popped with vibrant colors of life.
To conclude, Colors, hence form the core of every individual only waiting for a heart that will let it usher and Google Maps’ Local Guides is the perfect bloom for an adventurous, exploring and truly colourful soul.
Thanking You,
Mohammed Imteshal Karim
Local Guide Level 7, Cuttack, India