Francisco Augusto Vieira Nunes, Bacurau, was born in Manicoré, Amazonas state in 1939. Bacurau had Hansen’s disease at the age of five, during the 1940s. Ever since childhood, he learned very closely about prejudice and isolation from social life. As an adolescent, he went on to live in the hospital-colony of Porto Velho and there they started called him Bacurau, which is a region bird’s name.

In the beginning of the 1960s, he was hospitalized at the Souza Araújo colony in Rio Branco, Acre state. For his effective involvement in the community issues, he became a respectful community leader. Until his death in 1997, he participated actively in several social struggles and was acknowldeged and awarded internationally for his initiatives and achievements. Bacurau was one of the founders of the Movement to Reinsert People afflicted with Hansen’s disease – Morhan – in 1981.

The Bacurau Memory Room is a space created to keep part of his life and work and it is located in Rio Branco, in the house he lived to the end of his life. The idea of making a creative, web-based version is a way to turn his history universal. Moreover, the effort is to publish his restless pursuit for human rights and for dignity of those with Hansen’s disease and any other patology.

The humanist and corageous trajectory of Bacurau is good as a model for those let fate drive their lives, but it is also a reinforcement of the spirit of struggle of those trying to convey social changes. For this reason, the Memory Room and this website are not only needed, but also indispensable. It is worth remembering the people who have not given in when faced with dificulties and omissions.

The words of Bacurau need to be broadened and replicated. The dream of Bacurau needs to be fed, for his dream is the dream of everyone who belives in a better future.