My name is Aglaé.
Aglaé is an unusual French name. It comes from Greece, but my father found it in a Russian novel that he read when he was a teenager. He loved the name straight away and waited for about 15 more years until he finally had a daughter to give it to... My mum did not have much of a choice on that one. But I guess she loved my dad enough to fall in love with the name as well.
I moved from France to North Wales over six years ago, with a lot of dreams and hope in my head and the vision of a bright and loving future. Here too, the name Aglaé raised a lot of surprise and question marks. Pronunciation awkwardness, worried interrogative looks when I get introduced to new people... But instead of making me feel like a proper stranger in a strange country, I started developing real affection for all these people who were trying so hard to call me by my name, or the ones who gave up and decided to find all sorts of nicknames to overcome the confusion. This game allowed me to integrate more and more and become Welsher than I thought I could ever be.
That was the start of my Welsh life, which soon turned into my Pirate life.
Through my encounters and adventures in North Wales I came across one of the most singular spirits I have ever met. His name is Liam, and his sense of innovation, as well as his little pinch of madness, had brought him to buy a chapel with the idea to transfrom it into a pirate ship. A ship that could enhance creativity and help the most inventive minds to find solutions to overcome the drastic ecological and social problems faced by our planet. An Astralship.
To be honest, the first time Liam exposed his idea of Astralship to me, I laughed a lot. I only thought it was amazingly romantic. Time made me realise that if indeed we were to find so drastic solutions that could solve the so drastic problems of our planet, we had to cut down the traditional ways of finding solutions and adopt some more risky paths. Astralpirate paths.
So I joined the crew. I helped Liam getting more organised, and gave the ship a good clean. I started cooking for the pirates and because they seemed to be enjoying my hand-made bread I felt comfortable and decided to sail on.
In short, if somebody asks me how I became an Astralpirate, I think my answer would be : "Quite naturally really. I was given an unusual name so I thought I should probably be having an unusual job. And my strong faith for humanity and deep love for the planet kind of logically led me to meet Liam, to get to know him, and gave me the will to join the crew. To start sailing. To make things happen. That is all. That is the simple way how I became an Astralpirate..."