Its hard to say why I started to contribute as a local guide for Google Maps. I guess it all started with the increase in tourism in my country some years back. More and more people started to discover Georgia for the first time but the infrastructure was lagging behind. There really was no information readily available for them to plan their visit so I would frequently encounter tourists just stumbling around the city looking for directions. Georgians in general love to receive guests and be as helpful as they can. I am no different.
I found it very rewarding to just give them advice or send them in the right direction. It was a logical next step to start contributing to Maps once I discovered the possibility. I cannot say there is a particular theme I prefer to contribute to, anything someone could find interesting I gladly add information. The why of it is just simply that I enjoy being helpful.
For past few years I started working at National Agency for Cultural Heritage Preservation. We started a monumental task of cataloging all the heritage sites. I cannot wait to start adding more of such locations to the map, since I feel like they are vastly underrepresented when compared to places like restaurants and hotels. Here’s a little snippet of what is to come:
