~ about the artist ~ So, you have clicked on the picture ~ welcome to this not-so-apparent page reserved only for the very attentive and the very curious, who are brave enough to click around. As you have seen on another place on my website, more specifically the Poetry page, my name is Eki Talasi; that is, this is my pen name. The name that my parents gave me is Helen :) Often, I was referred to as Helen of Troy or Mona Lisa because of my warm smile, which is coincidentally the feature that everyone notices first upon meeting me. To start from the very beginning, I had a magical childhood. I grew up in the Mediterranean lands and spent all my vacations in a little town near Dubrovnik called Mlini. In Mlini, my grandfather built a small stone house with a pink roof, which I called home during those times. Around my home, there grew a luscious garden with numerous fruits and vegetables and nuts (that I eagerly picked of the trees or vines and ate) and had a most stunning view of the seacoast on one side and a small mountain, if you can call it that, range on the other. I grew up climbing trees and playing until my little eyes fell asleep. When not vacationing, and this is where I was born too, my family lived in Sarajevo. I once made up a little story about the city’s name (I like to do that), which translated into English means “Sara is a buffalo”. Sarajevo was a beautiful place, city cradled between seven mountains, and looked especially magical when it snowed, which was from about October to about April. This is also where I first fell in love ~ with life and with a boy, who I later found out had died during the war of 1992. Thanks to the circumstances, and my physician step-father, my family moved to the United States in March of 1991. I was 16 at that time and not at all happy to leave my oh-so-very-important teenage life and all my friends. But snatched away was I from the comforts of my hometown and thrust into my, later discovered, true home. This is where the rest of my life began and is still developing. Between working (mostly libraries), gaining an education (BS in Psychology and French), and loving (2 ex-marriages), I have had what most would consider a full, happy, healthy, and wonderful life. I even became a mom, which was something that my little heart always longed for. My little one is appropriately named after Love, Philia, for how much she is loved. So, this is where you now find me reader. This website is a small compilation of my life’s work and is always in progress. I hope that you take pleasure in sharing a bit of my soul and have enjoyed reading this short and unconventional autobiography :) In case you are wondering, this is what I look like, on an average day: