It's the only way to query as relays don't offer startsWith queries.
The [g] tags are geohash, at decreasing resolution levels. I'm not sure if the latter is very useful, perhaps it makes it easier to query relays? cc nostr:npub1gcxzte5zlkncx26j68ez60fzkvtkm9e0vrwdcvsjakxf9mu9qewqlfnj5z
It's the only way to query as relays don't offer startsWith queries.
Actual geo queries should be supported, the. You just need 1 g tag