What does the Local Guides program mean to you?
Before actively making a post on Google, I did not know what was meant by a local guide. It all started a few years ago while on the way back from Jakarta’s Soekarno Hatta airport to home.
In the taxi, amidst the usual traffic congestion in Jakarta, I casually took a photo, by accident. The picture is just ordinary one, an area outside the highway filled with buildings, with a rather dramatic cloud. Then I save it in my cellular phone and usually just keep it there and perhaps someday I will go back and try to remember which places I have visited. But somehow, that day, on my phone there were instructions from google to upload the photo and I just do it, assuming it doesn’t really matter.
Time passed, when I was browsing through the Google browser, I found the photo was seen by many people. Hmm … cool I thought. I feel really excited. That first photo (err actually it is the second one) is among my most viewed photos (of course, popular in my version means if it viewed by hundreds viewers, but thank God now it has 4852 views 
). That posting inspired me to produce more and better photos.
I feel like finding my passion and purpose in making documentation related to places I visited. This is made easy by the settings on my cellphone that automatically ask for comments and additional photos various places I visited. It makes me more excited especially when I read reports from Google that tells me number of viewers. I feel happy and it makes my life meaningful. Especially when some of my comments received appreciation and feedback from the owner of the place I reviewed. It feels so good, there is happiness that I get when I can share with others. It makes me can’t wait to take photos to share them and give positive comments and views.
Google ranks me as a level 6 local guide. Wow, I didn’t realize that. I feel like I haven’t done much yet. There are still many things that I can share. Showing people a new menu, introducing a small business, giving a positive review, those are the small things that I am very happy to do. Hopefully what I did I can be useful for many people and also be a door of fortune for the welfare of others. I am happy when others are happy and their business is getting better because of it. Because in my opinion, that’s what the world needs now. Share and pass on happiness forward to others.
Thank you Google for providing inspiration and making my life more meaningful.