About Borut Maričić

It is perhaps not wise to believe much in what people tell you about themselves, but if you are still interested, then I wish you a good wind for surfing! You can look at my curriculum vitae, but more important things are on this page.

Roots

My mother was born in Maribor and my father in Veles. I was born in 1960 in Zagreb. My grand parents also came from different parts of the Balkans.

In 1965/66 I spent one year with my parents in Philadelphia. Apart from that, I lived in Zagreb until 1991. Since late 1991 I live in Leoben - the image at right was taken in 2002 in the Austrian province of Styria.

Travel

During my childhood I travelled a lot with my parents and am happy that I had the opportunity to do so. Some places I have traveled to until 2003 are: almost all possible parts of the Balkans (there was once a big country called Yugoslavia there, you know!), a great part of Europe (for example Italy, France, Spain, Great Britain, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Austria, ex-Czechoslovakia, Hungary, ex-Soviet Union), USA, Mexico, Australia.

Dogs

In 1978 I started studying on the Electrical engineering faculty in Zagreb. As I was in my first year, I went out one day and returned home with a small dog puppy. We gave him a name Brik. He was vary small at that time and I knew nothing about dogs (but did have experience with many other pets). With time, he became as a brother to me and he made my life happy. Twelve years later I learned how very difficult it is when you have to make choices over life and death for someone who is not able to tell you his own choice. It is only when you have a dog that you know how it is without him. Then I decided that Brik will be my one and only dog.

Ten years later I somehow forgot the fact that in the end of every life there will be death. My colleague had a dog who just became a father. I learned that one of the sons was free to have. His name was Aron (until then I did not know that it was the name of Elvis Presley, too). I wrote these lines in 2003 and Aron was already like a brother to me. The circle is repeating again and again, for dogs, people, planets, stars...

Web

Although I have an e-mail address since 1987 or so, it was in spring of 1996 that I started surfing the Web. At that time I was searching for the culture of my childhood environment. I was able to find many literary texts written by Balkan authors and keyed-in by many persons who will never become so well known as the authors they admire. I was collecting the links to South Slavic literature in what later became known as South Slavic Literature Library. If you understand any of the South Slavic languages, I would like to share this poem by Tin Ujević with you: Brotherhood of Persons in Universe. In my literature collection or elswhere you might find some similar poems (in South Slavic languages).

When I reached 40, I started paying attention to something that I heard long ago: "It is hard when you want to ask something and then realize that those who could answer are no longer here." So, in January 2001, I started scanning the old photos and writing down what my mother could tell me about them. In 2002 I started to work on a tool that would enable me to do things more efficiently.

From time to time I write small texts and collect them in what I call A Book in Making. I also took many photos, some of which are in A Photo Gallery (also the Summer of 1997). Finally, here is my Guest Book and contact information.