PJ Rich - Free Tag

April 2012. A rusted Harley washes ashore in North America after drifting 4,000 miles from the Japanese tsunami. Harley Davidson offered to make it brand new for free, and a 29 year old man who had nothing left turned them down. His name was Ikuo Yokoyama. Before the March 2011 earthquake, that black 2004 Night Train was everything to Yokoyama. Then the tsunami hit Miyagi Prefecture, killing 15,000 people, including three members of his own family. For over a year, Yokoyama slept on the floor of a tiny temporary shelter. Everything he had ever owned was at the bottom of the Pacific. Or so he thought. When Peter Mark discovered the salt crusted bike inside a broken storage box on Graham Island, Harley executives in Milwaukee stepped up. They offered to restore every bolt and fly the gleaming machine home to Japan. Yokoyama shook his head. He could not bear the thought of riding a shiny motorcycle past grieving neighbors who had lost their spouses and kids. Instead, he gave up the last surviving piece of his old life. He asked Harley to display the bike untouched in Wisconsin, still crying ocean salt and red rust, as a voice for the 15,000 people who could no longer speak. It stands there untouched to this day. A man who lost everything refused a brand new dream so 15,000 strangers would never be erased from memory.