Born and raised in Eastern Europe, at the age of 20 Ili Mais packed a suitcase, bought a one-way ticket to the US and flew across the ocean. Since then she got a degree in religion, lived in India, hiked the Himalayas and all around Asia, climbed some of the highest dunes of the Namib Desert in Africa, traveled and worked with a carnival and lived with a group of friends on a marijuana farm.
Today Ili Mais lives in a refurbished shut down gas station building in the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania, making surrealistic art, playing piano and reading. Her cannabis farm memories inspired her recent debut novel “Bwanana Chaos”.
