The Basque poet Ekaitz Goienetxea lived in Maribor in 2016 as part of an exchange program for authors who create in small and minor languages. As part of this project, which is called Other Words, ten writers' residencies line up each year. The X-OP Society for Contemporary Art is one of five participating organizations in the field of culture (the rest come from Friesland, Macedonia, Ireland, and Macedonia) participating in a project that started this year and will run until 2019. During the writers' residencies, guest authors present themselves at literary events, presentations, participate in various workshops, round tables, festivals, hold lectures and meet the literary scene creators in a local, regional, national context.

Ekaitz Goienetxea read selected poems by Basque authors on World Poetry Day on Monday, 21 March 2016, at 7 pm at the KIBLA Multimedia Center in Basque. The poems were read in English translations by Miha Malenšek, a student of the II gimnazija in Maribor. With the event, Ekaitz marked World Poetry Day, which takes place every year on 21 March and was declared by UNESCO in 1999. The poetry reading was the first of the events that took place during Ekaitz's eight-week residency in Maribor. At the event, Ekaitz introduced the contemporary Basque authors: Harkaitz Cano, Pako Aristi, Leire Bilbao, and Hedoi Etxarte.

On Thursday, 12 May 2016, at 5 pm, Ekaitz Goienetxea presented Basque literature, i.e., literature written in the Basque language, at the nanotourism agency 'Rajzefiber biro' in Maribor. He talked about statistics concerning circulation, the number of readers, and the number of books sold, which writers have to achieve for their works to become 'bestsellers.' He explained the history of literature in Basque and explained the position of Basque literature today in more detail.

The residency was part of the Other Words project (2015—2019) co-funded by the Creative Europe program by the European Union. The project was also co-funded by the Minsitry of Public Administration of the Republic of Slovenia and Municipality of Maribor.