It’s been two months since I started to edit the Ilagan River again. While I had done so in the past, way before these two months, this period turned out to be a great adventure that I’m still hiking.

It was a time after Project CaCau. When I put it to an end, I felt not only disappointed, but ambitious. Why exactly? Well, I don’t know, but the roaring engine I had used to keep me going through that project was still on, and I couldn’t just stop it. So, I had to redirect it somewhere.

For a bit, I had just redirected it to OSM. I experimented with multiple things and tried to pick up my old stuff. But one in particular caught my attention. A while ago, I was editing the river area of the Ilagan River. I never picked it up again until then. Despite that, it just stuck. Starting in the 15th of September, I got into the flow of the edits, and I never stopped.

I didn’t just do the main river either. I had also started doing its tributaries because my satisfaction didn’t get put with just that. Then, suddenly, the Bintacan River got finished, then the Nanaguan, and then I was suddenly speeding through the headwaters of the Abuan. I was now pushing 2K-3K edits a day, with the little free time I had.

My satisfaction didn’t stop; I had also started mapping the landslide areas. Now, at that point, I was satisfied. I had forgotten Project CaCau and its shadow that burdened me. Then, I realized: why not make this run official? Make it a project? So, I did.

Enter, Project KarayanIlagan. It meant “Ilagan River” in Ilocano: Karayan as River, and Ilagan as itself. Nothing changed in my workflow; just that I finally had a name to keep it going and back it up, putting hashtag comments for it as #KarayanIlagan (and later on with #ChasingWaterways for my fellow mappers’ initiative), and to give it a history and recognition.

Now, we place it here, right now. By the time I made this diary, I had gotten to 2nd in most map changes in the whole Philippines. I am still going, editing the waters of the River Abuan to contribute to my own project, ChasingWaterways, OpenStreetMap, and the Philippines itself. Eventually, I will finish, but for now, I will keep going.

To the people who see this, please hope for me to succeed. God bless, and Mabuhay!