When I was doing my student exchange in Canada, Ontario, Kingston - I often travel out to big cities like Toronto, Montreal and Quebec. As a traveller, I relied a lot on Google reviews, ‘nearby cafes/restaurants/attractions’ and lists on Google Maps to help me make the best out of my time in a city.
How I started as a Local Guide
I started leaving traces and thoughts on the places I’ve been to on Google while waiting for my friends to finish up their food. It started off with my first review at Hanabusa cafe at Kensington Market in Toronto and shortly after I was surprised that I received a reply from the owner.
Back then, I got laughed at for constantly writing reviews because it doesn’t seem as ‘cool’ or ‘millennial’ to be posting food/travel photos on Google. Most people upload these pictures on social media like Facebook or Instagram. I continued to do so with an intention to help other travellers who rely on Google reviews for their travels, with an aim to recommend more local eats at a city that is suitable for travellers as well.
I’d say I’m the type of traveller that prefers to discover hidden local gems as oppose to popular tourist sites. I’m a foodie myself hence I enjoyed sharing my opinion for the food I’ve tried. I remembered taking one photo of my breakfast near Mont-Royal in Montreal before taking a hike. Months later I received an email telling me that my photo was making a difference with 20,000 views! I never ever expected that a small gesture of uploading a photo or writing a short review would have made such a huge difference in another person’s lives, or even contribute to a community.
Subsequently, I received emails from Google Maps telling me that my reviews have been contributing to the community. 100,000 views may not seem much as compared to millions and millions of views other local guides here receive, but to me it was such a huge achievement.
Discovering Hidden Gems
I rely a lot on Google Maps to manoeuvre my way through small towns and cities. I remembered when I was solo-travelling in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, I was trying to find small cafes around my accommodation but couldn’t find a couple of them as they were not really popular on Google. I stumbled upon Believe Cafe - a small container cafe by the road, that didn’t look really fancy but what I discovered later on was so much more than that.
You could tell how tiny Believe coffee was as they only had a tiny bench that could fit up to 2 people. I exchanged a conversation with the stall owner - Titi with her limited English and my limited Bahasa Indonesia.
We managed to hold an hour-long conversation and Titi invited me out to have dinner with later that night!
She unexpectedly picked me up with a Vespa scooter and drove me around Yogyakarta town, exploring many local eats. These eats were all not featured on Google Maps because they are either roadside stalls or temporary pushcarts that do not have a permanent stall.
Joy
We had dinner by this roadside pushcart stall with no air-conditioner nor a proper shelter, but this was one of the heartiest meal I’ve had today - 1) a new found friendship 2) discovering hidden gems together with a local. Such unexpected friendships continued to blossom when a Hong Kong friend visited me back home in Singapore. I brought Faye to try our local Hainanese chicken rice, in which she fell in love with at her first bite.
The most interesting thing as a local guide is definitely discovering that love is exchanged through the simple act of exchanging cultural cuisines. I think unexpectedly discovering genuine connection and friendships through exploring the food scene in each city meant more than the numbers I gained when posting photos and videos as reviews. As a Singaporean, we are rather conservative hence the amount of meet-ups here are limited. But that doesn’t stop me from sharing my love for food, cafes and the culture here. They say that shared joy is double joy, that joy of finding out someone enjoys your recommendation is twice that of enjoying it yourself. While I have yet to meet many other local guides, I’m excited to continue sharing my culture with others, and discover other local cultures in many different cities.
Cheers,
Chow
Hope to invite you to connect with other Singapore based Local Guides (I’m trying to round everyone up haha) by joining our FB group -