I have been OSM mapper since February 2015 and got enthusiastic about the change I was making in #MapLesotho. Being the spatial planner I realised the importance of OpenstreetMap data and how it would be useful in my job.

Being number one mapper in Lesotho opened doors for me, and in September 2016 I won a scholarship to study in Ireland doing MSc in Spatial Planning at Dublin Institute of Technology. I adapted easily in Ireland & met Ireland OSM community and also continued training school kids to map, and also how to use different Phone Apps such as mapillary, OSM Tracker, street complete and maps.me.

I wanted to be able to map more than what #MapLesotho taught me, so simaltaneous to moving to Ireland for town planning scholarship and internship I started mapping Ireland. I adapted to different ways of mapping and started mapping things in Ireland that aren’t there in Lesotho such as the coast and heritage sites, different tags for different road uses, such as bicycle lanes, bus lanes, footpath etc. It was also fascinating to map high buildings because they are frequent in Ireland using maps.me and the sudden change when editing height of the buildings using the app was entertaining as well. Streetcomplete is another app that always got me curious because the more I used it the more I got different kinds of stuff to edit which I would say widened my experience with Tags also.

Being in a new country of course I wanted to get out and about, so I turned my curiosity into mapillary trips in all 32 counties and I became number 2 mapillary contributor in Ireland. The truth about me is when I do mapping stuff I make sure I do it well and conquer, hahah😊.

In June I became mapper of the month and that took me by surprise when I was contacted by a person I have never talked to before Marc Gemis because I never thought there are people out there who notice the effort and the changes I was making.

I know a lot of countries and places I have never been through mapping and I never want to stop. Anyday without mapping is a bad day for me. The mappers in the places I have lived know I show up and do my part and help others. I don’t disguise that I am also happy to map on my own and I like to help new mappers all the time. Vote for me if you are like me, or want there to be more of me. If I win this I will show it to others to inspire them to start mapping.