Introduce Yourself - March 2017

[estebanl]

Hi everyone! 

1. Name : Esteban
2. Location: Grand Rapids MI,  where I am [apparently] the only Local Guide in Grand Rapids, MI. I am actively trying to recruit more guides to go on photo walks with me and really put this city on the map.
3. What I Like About Local Guides: I am a big fan of all things Googley and the idea of building something based off of the goodwill and knowledge people are willing and able to supply. I am an idealist when it comes to crowd-sourcing and contributions to the world's knowledge bank.
4. I Love to Share: I like to add new places that otherwise would not be easily found. I like to travel without a plan and let Google Local Guides in the area decide for me. I have never been disappointed but reviews and recommendations from Local Guides.
5. How I got Into Local Guides: I work in digital marketing and started getting into Local Guides while helping small business owners claim their businesses on GMB and get their information correctly on the map.
6. A Little About Me: I love old-timey maps and globes. I think Local Guides is a great way to be a modern-day cartographer. If any of you have any ideas or insights on how to draw people into Local Guide nerdiness, I'd be happy to hear about them.

[EkendraL]

Hello there! Namaste!!

Even though I'm not new to Google Maps and Google Street View, Local Guides Connect is new to me as I joined this community only on December 2016. I don't see emails from Google Maps mentioning this Connect community, hence delay in joining and meeting minds alike here.

To start, let me introduce myself:

1. Name: Ekendra Lamsal
2. Location: Pokhara, Nepal (really a beautiful place to visit)
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: Every email I receive from Google Local Guides brings a big smile to me - thanks to those genuine reviews and photos that help thousands of visitors and users thru out the destinations I visit. This inspires me to share more and that's what I love being a Local Guide.
4. I love to share: I love to share photos (specifically 360 or Street Views) plus point-of-interest specific information such as restaurant menus, ticket price and rules for visiting monuments and others. This will help others prepare for their visits in advance.
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I was lost in a city abroad. That was due to my inability to find the North at that time. I kept on exploring the Maps app for settings thinking there would be option for geographical north, and I saw this thing called Contributions. Joined immediately and shared my experiences and even added some information.
6. Fun Fact About Me: I work for the government, lot of local governments in fact. I love sharing precise location of those local government entities and the street view of the government buildings. Officials always get excited to see 360 view of their office complex or premises. I use an Android phone to do so and yet to own a physical 360 camera.

Thanks for reading.

[VaibhavP]

1. Name: Vaibhav
2. Location: India, Pune
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: Current days everyone is relying on Google Map while travelling. It’s a very proud moment for me if I could help any single person to reach his required destination.
4. I love to share: I love to share reviews about the places like hotels, shops etc.  with the help of photos.
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I was trying to correct one wrong address on google map and then suddenly I got mail regarding Local Guide concept.
6. Fun Fact About Me: I love travelling. I enjoy the local food whenever I travel to different places. I like to interact with new people…

[messaoudb]

Name: Messaoud
Location: Tunisia
What do I love about being a Local Guide: best type to help each other, know every place anywhere
I love to share: i love to share beautifull places in my Country, and exactly in my Area cause it's a nice destination.
How did I hear about Local Guides: when i had adding photos in Maps and prompted to join Local Guides.
Fun Fact About Me: i Love trekking, desert, Village places, taking photos in the right time !!!

Welcome 

[Matt5htp]

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@YanniY wrote:
The "Introduce Yourself" threads (you can find Jan 2017 and Feb 2017) get really long so we start new ones regularly and lock the old ones. Be sure to check the old threads to see who already joined and where they are from. If you're new, please use this thread to post your "I'm new" or "Hello world" posts. We will move any we find into here to keep the site organized.

Hi everyone! Welcome to Local Guides Connect.

Please take a moment to introduce yourself to the community.

To start, let me introduce myself:

1. Name: Yanni
2. Location: Singapore
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: A single contribution from a Local Guide on Google Maps can help users around the world make informed decisions that could result in a wonderful experience. Amazing!
4. I love to share: I love to share photos so that other Local Guides can see the world through my eyes.
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I was sharing a review of a place on Google Maps and was prompted to join Local Guides.
6. Fun Fact About Me: I love photography and hoped that I could be a nature photographer next time. That’s me attempting to shoot a quokka that sneaked up on me!

Your turn next!

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Hello, Matthew here from Boston MA I am new on here and have never posted but have been contributing reviews,photos and updates since late 2015. I started with reviews in San Diego California and love reading others reviews so I started adding a few myself. Then I loved sharing my own photos with others and felt adding more content would help others and local guides. After awhile I found myself addicted to posting on here not just for the other guides but people like myself who like to go on here to get info and find out there is much more to the Google maps than I thought and that's when I really found out what Local Guides was all about. I love to travel been traveling the USA all  over for years now. and have visited 36 states. Now I have recently been to Asia and saw Vietnam,Thailand My goal now is to step foot in in all 7 continents while contributing more to Google.

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@YanniY wrote:
The "Introduce Yourself" threads (you can find Jan 2017 and Feb 2017) get really long so we start new ones regularly and lock the old ones. Be sure to check the old threads to see who already joined and where they are from. If you're new, please use this thread to post your "I'm new" or "Hello world" posts. We will move any we find into here to keep the site organized.

Hi everyone! Welcome to Local Guides Connect.

Please take a moment to introduce yourself to the community.

To start, let me introduce myself:

1. Name: Yanni
2. Location: Singapore
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: A single contribution from a Local Guide on Google Maps can help users around the world make informed decisions that could result in a wonderful experience. Amazing!
4. I love to share: I love to share photos so that other Local Guides can see the world through my eyes.
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I was sharing a review of a place on Google Maps and was prompted to join Local Guides.
6. Fun Fact About Me: I love photography and hoped that I could be a nature photographer next time. That’s me attempting to shoot a quokka that sneaked up on me!

Your turn next!

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[AdarshGoyal]

Adarsh Goyal

I was working as local guides from past years but today connected to this Local Guides Connect as seen in the Local Guides Summit email which i received today..

Hello Guides & Fellow Mates..!!

My Name is Adarsh Goyal which can also be seen in top of this post...

I am From Bangalore, INDIA, the largest democratic & a Beautiful Country the Google's CEO belongs to.

being a local guide i enjoy to help people get to know about the places & with the pics to know it much better.. its interesting to do & give a helpful feeling..

I love to share my personal experiences with the people that how i see that place with the true reviews..

I heard about the local guides when i first thought to add  a place as help, got an email and then its just started and now reached too far ..

Well Fun fact about me is that i love photography , actually photography sickness haha.. as an engineering student excited about new tech & having personal experience of it... frank happy and helpful person (well people say so.. 😛 )

This was all about me , MY INTRO...

Hoping to connect with more people and having a great time...

[VasylS]

Hi everyone!

My turn now:

1. Name: Vasyl
2. Location: Ukraine
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: Amazingly easy and fun way to make the world a better place!
4. I love to share photos, as sometimes I manage to make realy nice pics. Adding missing information about places, correct mistakes - that's also a big thing for me. 
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I was prompted to join Local Guides, don't really remember at which circumstances
6. Fun Fact About Me: I am inherently prone to really counterproductive perfectionism, which I rather successfully suppress in my daily life. But while in my Local Guide role, I can let this evil creature play to the fullest. Making contributions is a great way to shift the focus, relieve the stress, relax and recuperate.

[YumnaH]

Hello Local Guides,

I stumbled my way into this because google maps kept asking me questions and I kept answering them without realizing that there was a whole community behind the scenes. So, now that I am aware - HELLO!

1. Name: Yumna
2. Location: Bangalore
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: Since I've just started being conscious of the process, this is a bit off the cuff. I'd say it was probably the experience of noticing my city (and other places) around me, and then picking the best bits to present it to others.
4. I love to share: Photographs with friends, although I'm very wary of sharing them publicly. Once I realised that I was on a system and I could level up by adding photographs, I went through tons of my archives, trying to find ones that didn't have people in them to put up.
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I noticed that Google Maps was grading me on my responses to its questions.
6. Fun Fact About Me: I'm stereotypically girly, in that I'm crazy about horses and books.

Here's a photograph of my son and me, who's also horse-mad, from our trip to Yercaud Lake this weekend past.

[MihaiHaiHui]

Hi all this is me:

1 NAME: Mihai Preda.
2. LOCATION: All Europe, being a truck driver.
3. WHAT DO I LOVE ABOUT BEING A LOCAL GUIDE:

It's better than hunting pokemons in all cities I visited. Now my "pokemons” are real and helps a lot of people.

4 I LOVE TO SHARE: Photos, for sure, I shoot everything.
5 HOW DID I HEAR ABOUT LOCAL GUIDES: From Google, it always ask me: “Be a local guide! Be a local guide! Now you could be already at level twooo!!!”
6 FUN FACTS ABOUT ME: I peel banana inverse.

[DannaC]

1. Name: Danna Crawford
2. Location: Ocala Florida
3. What do I love about being a Local Guide: I love everything social media. Especially writing reviews on Yelp and trip adviser so this seemed a natural fit for me. 
4. I love to share: I love to share photos from my travels. 
5. How did I hear about Local Guides: I received an email about it from google.
6. Fun Fact About Me: I am in the eBay Hall of Fame! It is a prestigious award given to me in 2008!