The only thing that I regret about joining the local guides program is, joining it late!
No words can describe the feeling that I got when I saw the satellite image of my house using Google Maps during my childhood. I got super excited when I saw my terrace and quickly called parents to take a look at it. That was my very first search on maps as far as I could remember. I am a sucker for food and travel and I’ve been using google maps for more than 15 years looking for places, seeing photos, reading reviews, getting directions but I’ve never thought of posting a photo or writing a review.
I can proudly say some of the best trips of my life happened ONLY because of maps and I always wonder how life will be without maps (you can’t imagine 
). June, 2019 is the month life taught me that you have to give back to the community that has given me experiences that I will never forget for a lifetime. So,there was this new in our city that the famous Turkish Ice Creams were introduced for the first time. I searched for the place on maps and I found that there was no photos or videos and even reviews. I’ve never seen a place on maps like that before. Every time when I used to search for a place there will be a lots of photos and reviews so I thought of uploading a photo for that ice cream shop. That is when I came to know about this amazing program.
I uploaded the first photo on maps and wrote a detailed review to it. Initially, my perception about this program was like it’s just like a game for me where you gain points and level up but little did I know that it is going to impact a lot of people. In just two days my views for the photo spiked up to thousands instantly and it started increasing day by day.
My perceptions about this program changed. At first, I was confused about going to this place since it had no reviews but now people will see my photos, they’ll read my review which will help them decide quickly. The views and likes didn’t feel like numbers to me anymore, it is a person who is giving his precious time to take a look at my thoughts. There are a lot of platforms like Facebook, Instagram etc etc to share your reviews and thoughts about a place but it will take time and a lot of efforts to get noticed whereas here things can get escalated real quick, in just few months you’ll see your reviews and photos reaching millions of people around the world. How amazing is that! I suddenly felt like I’ve made a big difference to that place and it made me more responsible. That is the day I took a decision to start contributing to google maps. Had I known about this program few years back it would been helpful for more people who wanted to plan their trip at the same time when I went or for the people who wanted to eat in a restaurant that I had food during that time.
I started writing detailed reviews about places that I went, my experiences, tips, tricks etc. I wanted to share all possible details about any place that I visited so that I will be helpful for people in some way or the other. It can solve a lot questions that can arise in their minds. I also started adding photos so that people can get an overall idea about any place that they want to visit. Even if there is a bad thing about a place I try to give some tips to improve it so that If the owner reads it, he can correct his mistakes to improve his customer service.
I’ve always been that person who feels that If you are not making someone’s life better then you are wasting your time. I always wanted to do that but never got a chance. Local Guides program is a gem that I’ve found to live my motto and I’m really really happy that thousands of people are getting benefited because of me. I’m gonna keep traveling to new places and keep eating in new restaurants for the rest of my life and I’ll make sure everyone in the world who is planning to do that gets every single information that they need on maps by sharing all of my experiences.
I also have a lot of ideas in my mind which can help people in a better way using maps and I will make sure it will reach ears of google maps team very soon and if it gets implemented in real life one day that will be the most happiest day for me.
Keep contributing! Keep Growing 
Sure, I can type paragraphs if I start thinking about things that I want to share with people. I’m happy that you had the patience to read my post fully. This will definitely motivate me to write more since you all are spending your precious time to sit and everything that I type no matter how big it is. Stay connected