First and foremost, a very big thank you to Google Malaysia (Zeff, Nadia, Adib, Russell, Sabrina, Rajan and the rest of the team) for giving us Local Guides community in Malaysia, the opportunity to host a meet-up event within the Google office, and giving us the chance to learn and know about the local Google office and programs that run out of it and more. It was a priceless opportunity for the Malaysia Local Guides community, as most of us haven’t visited any of Google’s offices before. And for all of us, it has been such an exciting experience, being Local Guides and also big users of Google’s many platforms, to finally come and visit the company ourselves. A biggest thank you again.
Malaysia Local Guides Meet-Up Day, 4th May 2019 (Saturday), 9am to 1pm
Google’s office in Malaysia. https://goo.gl/maps/Q3BZttYKgLGYx2F3A
Level 20, Axiata Tower, KL Sentral.
The day started early, as 22 of us, Local Guides in Malaysia, journeyed from different parts of the country to head to the center of Kuala Lumpur. A few had traveled over 350kms overnight on bus. A few came via long distance train journey of a few hours. The rest had arrived from different parts of the city. All of us congregating in the KL Sentral area where Google Malaysia’s office is. There was so much of excitement from many days before the meet-up, and all of us could not wait for the day to start. For most of us, it was our first time visiting Google Malaysia’s office, or any Google office. So, one could imagine the level of anticipation of what we will see in the company where so many products that drive our daily lives come from. Most of us had arrived near the area by 8.30am on the Saturday.
As we took the elevator up to the 20th floor, we were greeted by Google’s security administrator and our event badges. We were finally here! Excitement overflowed. It’s amazing how small things like this create so much of euphoria.
As our community members slowly trickled in, collected our badges, big smiles erupt from each face. Many of us know each other from the over 30 meet-ups we have had over the last 3 years. And it was just amazing meeting old friends again. And we also have many new first timers join our meet-up today as well. One thing is common, was the big smile on each face. A short greeting, creates friendships for life.
We as visitors to the Google office get access to the public area which include the arrival hall, the lounge, the cafeteria and the common rest and recreational area. As a small group of us arrived earlier, we had taken the opportunity to take some photos for our kind memories of the place, early in the morning.
And nothing was going to stop each of us taking lots of photos with the main Google signage at the arrival hall. We must have taken over 1000 photos among all of us. Here are just a very few selection of how proud we are as Google users and contributors.
Google Malaysia (another million thank you), had catered some light snacks and coffee for breakfast for our meet-up event, and it was a great time for us to quickly grab a bite and catch up with friends whom we have not met for some time, and also to welcome new comers who were joining our meet-up for the first time. So much joy can be felt reverberating through the area. All smiles and laughter.
Soon, we had congregated into the main conference room in Google Malaysia, where the head of communications Zeff had introduced himself, and each of us likely. It was just such a friendly and warming atmosphere, like a big family reunion. As Zeff went on to share about the Google office and the many programs there, we were just absorbing the information and taking photos of ourselves and the event. One great thing that we all learnt was that we can all help and contribute more for the betterment of the society.
A few of us also volunteered to share more about the community, programs and personal experiences. Stephen (myself), shared about our many wonderful meet-ups that our community had organized. Emily shared about her personal experiences on how she joined the Local Guides program and how she contributed a lot to the tourism of her local area. Kak Husniah shared about how she came to be a Local Guide and more. Nabeel shared about what he is doing to improve the community. And finally Pavel shared about his journey with Local Guides.
After a bit more discussion on future plans for the community, we 22 Malaysia Local Guides was given a wonderful tour of the public area of the Google office. We had the wonderful opportunity visit the recreational area, the many unique meeting rooms, the beautifully decorated hallways, the Google doodle wall and more. It was just such a great opportunity to take even more photos.
Between the 22 of us, we must have taken a few thousand photos. (We were mindful not to capture anything even remotely private). And each area that we walked through, it was just a photo fest. Such great excitement when a team of Google fans visit Google.
Our group photo in the main conference room
Our group photo in the main welcome lobby.
Our photo taking session went on for almost 20 minutes, before we relented and headed to the Google cafeteria. Google Malaysia had catered lunch for all of us (another million thank you). It was just timely for our meet-up to be just 2 days before Ramadan starts when fasting month for Muslims begin. The 22 of us were continually taking photos through out lunch. See all the wonderful smiles in each of our faces.
We had a good 30-45 minutes sitting with each other, chatting about our previous events and catching up with old friends, as we munched away at the nice food that Google Malaysia had catered for us. Our time spent together was just priceless.
After lunch, we took a bit of time to just ensure we helped clean up the place, rearranged everything neatly and orderly as how it was before we arrived. Soon it was time to head off, and how fast time flies. 4 hours had passed and it was just over 1pm. We all said farewell to our hosts and promised that we will be back stronger and larger the next time round.
It has been such a wonderful experience for each and everyone of us in this meet-up. It gave us motivation that we will improve our quality of contributions and to help others learn more about the Local Guides program and other Google programs.
Watch our quick short video of a few of our photos.
Again, another big thank you to Google Malaysia for hosting our meet-up this time round.
Special thanks to Zeff, Nadia, Adib, Russell, Sabrina, Rajan and the rest of the team.
Special thanks to our community members who made this incredible meet-up possible.
Malaysia Local Guides
- Stephen Abraham (@stephenabraham)
- Lycoris Goh (@Lycoris94)
- Emily Lowe (@Emily2U)
- Wong Chee Weng (@Cweng)
- Alsmie Alias (@AlsmieA)
- Eugene Wong (@EugeneWong)
- Shahril Affandi (@
- Husniah binti Buang (@
- Patrick Chuan (@
- Jerry Song (@JerrySong)
- Daniel Tang (@dantang)
- Fikri Idris (@Mrspade85)
- Akmal Bajwa (@AkmalB)
- Pavel Sarwar (@PavelSarwar)
- Syed Haseeb (@Haseeb)
- Nabeel Tirmazi (@nabeeltirmazi)
- Saidul Islam (@Saidulkarim)
- Saqib Ali (@Saqis9966)
- Ahmed Ali (@Jango17)
- Gini Gangadharan (@Gini)
- Premchand Mukkara (@Premchandmukkara)
Best regards
Steve
Just sharing as an addition to our media interviews by Google Malaysia @CharmN
