A Pirate’s Life for Me

From what I understand of Azores history, the islands served as transAtlantic fueling stations and historically housed whalers and fisherman. But it’s easy to imagine them as a pirate’s paradise. Do the locals identify much with pirates the way folks in the American Southwest do with bandits? Or are pirates always the bad guys in Azorean stories? Whether this is sanctioned public art reflecting the local culture or punk protest of it, I think these are words to live by.