My journey as a local guide has been quite an eventful one, loaded with so many interesting moments. One thing I love to do is making a bold statement with my activities as a local guide. I am a success enthusiast and having defined my motive, becoming a successful local guide, as I wrote on connect, became my major priority. Did I tell you that I am also curious and adventurous? These attributes have really helped me to explore every possible avenue to make meaningful impact as a local guide.
As we all know every effort has a reward. My passion for consistent and quality contributions to Google maps earned me an invitation to attend Connect live 2019 in San Jose, California. It is a glorious moment I will never forget in a hurry. Since then, I have had wonderful experiences and done interesting things to help a lot of people make informed and important decisions while exploring the world around them.
Whether adding new places, writing reviews, uploading photos to Google maps, or hosting a meet-up promoting inclusiveness remains the most interesting thing I have done as a local guide. The local guides program has really helped me to appreciate the prisms through which different people see the world around them especially the physically challenged persons. Consequently, it has afforded me the opportunity to understand the world in the eyes of the physically challenged.
Basically, It is very important to me because I derive great joy and.a sense of fulfillment doing it… It is so gratifying to see people happy because of my contributions as a local guide. So I have engaged in a lot of projects to promote inclusiveness both on Google maps and on Connect. These broad base and well rounded projects have targeted the physically challenged persons, people with health challenges, people with special needs, the children, travelers, tourists and small businesses, even the women for inclusion. They are all inclusive in nature.
You know, I usually ask myself, how can my activities as a local guide benefit people in my community? Or how can I be fair to all with my contributions on Google maps? Hence, offering better life or better world experiences to as many people as possible through my contributions to Google maps is something I am passionate about. This has reflected in my local guides activities as many of them are altruistic, and have some humanitarian tendencies and coloration. They are directed towards the common good of the community, and by extension the entire world. These projects also seek to address the problem of lopsided contributions and discrimination against certain groups of people on Google maps. Obviously, I have made a bold statement through these inclusive projects.
It is a project targeting the physically challenged persons for inclusion on Google maps. This interesting project was inspired by a review on Google maps. The user wrote ‘the bridge is good. It helps me a lot because personally I don’t like crossing the highway apart from using the pedestrian bridge’. When I saw this review the question that crossed my mind then was; are there good and accessible pedestrian bridges around that can help people with disabilities (PWD’s) to cross the highways without endangering their lives?
The second question was how can I make the information about these accessible pedestrian bridges visible on Google maps? Hence, considering the physically challenged in my contributions to Google maps is such an interesting thing to do as a local guide.And I believe it is the collective responsibility of every local guide to consider the physically challenged persons while contributing to Google maps.
Most importantly, I created a list of some of the accessible pedestrian bridges around Lagos. This is to help the physically challenged persons to know where to locate these accessible pedestrian bridges in any part of Lagos. It will also help them cross the highways on wheelchairs, scooters, bike etc without endangering their lives. I also created a video to demonstrate what accessible pedestrian bridge is all about, and what it looks like as many people may not know.
In addition, I was able to submit an idea around this project, for a dedicated new category for pedestrian bridges in the idea exchange section of connect. This idea solicits for proper categorization of pedestrian bridges. Hence, pedestrian bridges will further be classified as accessible or not accessible considering accessible features like ramps, rails, width of the pathway etc. The project is ongoing and the idea is still open for voting.
The umuahia accessibility Outreach
Like I said earlier, being a local guide has afforded me the opportunity to do interesting things, and one of such things is hosting the Umuahia accessibility outreach meet up. The project basically was to promote inclusiveness. It was obviously targeted at the blind and the visually impaired for inclusion.This project was conceived the moment I unveiled this special school. I took it upon myself to make it visible on Google maps. The local guides program set the stage and made it possible.
It was a rare privilege meeting and interacting with the blind students and teachers of School for the blind, Umuahia. That interaction afforded me the opportunity to learn about a very important concept of accessibility- the e-accessibility for the blind. And it was good to see them happy, full of hope and energy in spite of their challenges. This meet-up was also a golden opportunity to impact their lives through charity and humanitarian gestures.
Mapping pediatric hospitals in Lagos is yet another interesting thing I have done as a local guide to promote inclusiveness. It was a bold statement projecting the children for inclusion on Google maps via children health care service. This project was borne out of my experience with a young school girl whom every attempt to treat her illness proved abortive.
However, it was not until her parent consulted a pediatrician that the illness was diagnosed as brain tumor. So having this knowledge that child health care is a delicate branch of medicine which not every hospital can handle. I began a project to map out the best pediatric hospitals in Lagos so that the lives of our children could be saved. I even created a list of the best pediatric hospitals in Lagos to help parents decide on which pediatric hospital to take their children to for treatment.
The project was well intended to check and reduce the incidence of child’s mortality rate to the barest minimum. This particular project attracted commendations from both local guides and Googlers alike. It was so interesting knowing that I have impacted the lives of these little angels through what I have done.
Unequivocally, promoting inclusiveness is the most interesting thing I have done because it is a unique way I make a bold statement as a local guide.Through inclusiveness I have been able to connect a lot of people to the world via the Google maps. And just like I posited in my connect live 2019 post, my priority as a local guide is;
‘… to help promote an all-inclusive accessibility on the Google maps. Accessibility for all where all Google maps users can benefit irrespective of gender, creed, language, status, race, and whether they are physically challenged or not. It is accessibility for all. I want to make sure everyone is given free and equal access to information on the Google maps app’.
Obviously, I feel very elated that I am one out of about 120 million local guides around the world, who are making bold statements and impacting humanity through their contributions on Google maps. And Knowing this becomes a source of great inspiration, motivation and the needed nudge to drive my passion for inclusion to the next level.
Definitely, there is urgent need to up the ante as far as inclusion on Google maps is concerned, and taking inclusiveness on Google maps to the next level is my aim. Promoting inclusiveness no doubt, will improve and impact positively on Google maps; make it more reliable; enlarge the sphere of influence of local guides; and add more value to Google maps users’ life. Surely, with inclusiveness there is prospect for the Local guides program and the Google maps in particularly.
What is the most interesting thing you have done as a local guide. Kindly share it in the comment thread
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