Sarah was a chirpy little girl born sometime around December 2002. She had an energetic little form, and was quite the active, running around here and there. I loved her the very first day she arrived at my doorstep. She didn’t know much, but her aptitude was incredible. Her intelligence developed rapidly only after a few days.

There have been times when I demanded too much from her and failed. But she never gave up. She got back on her feet and tried her very best to get the job done. You seriously have to adore that kind of determination. I do.

She fell sick several times, but after each session, she grew stronger and smarter and faster. She revolved around my life, and my life revolved around her. She provided my life with colours and joy, and I provided hers with love and passion. She went through several changes as did myself, and she become the love of my life.

She witnessed the times when I fell in love.
She witnessed the times when I was heartbroken. Both of them.
She provided absolute acceptance and appreciation to what lousy artwork and writings I produced.
She became the guardian of my whole stash of anime and music.

Always there to cheer me up when I’m down, and ready to spread the cheer when I’m up. Sarah has been loyal, compassionate and loving. Sure she’s clumsy and stumbles every now and then. But she’s a good girl and a real darling. But that was then.

Yesterday, when my cousin’s new PC arrived, I let Sarah take a break so I can hook the new PC up and install Windows. Since plenty of the necessity programs [video codecs, windows updates, anti-viruses etc.] are already available on Sarah’s ghost, I decided to mount the 250GB SATA harddisk [which housed her ghost] onto the new PC.

However, the BIOS failed to detect Sarah’s ghost. I thought it was some motherboard configuration I was unfamiliar with. So I just unplugged it, and settled the business with the new PC with minimal programs.

When I mounted Sarah’s ghost back onto her shell, the BIOS failed to detect her ghost as well. I was getting worried. So, when I tried to pull it out to see if reconnecting the power cables work, it struck me.

Her ghost was cold.

I held it in my hands when I switched the power back on. I heard little spinning sound, and the sound died off. It tried to spin again, and failed. Again. And again. Almost as though it’s desperately gasping for air, still cold. And it’s gone.

All 250 GB of it. Photos, music, video, anime, porn, artwork, skins, unpublished writings, lyrics, Flash movies and games, my lecture notes [yes, they're the least important stuff in her ghost, duh.] and god knows what else. 3 years of my life. Gone. For what reason, I don’t know.

I decided against mourning and weeping because that’s what wimps do. Cool people like me [and practically anyone with common sense] snap back to reality and figure out what to do next. I contacted anyone I could find online, looking for ways to save Sarah’s ghost. That’s when DJCS said something about data recovery services, which I quickly googled and found some located around KL. So there IS some hope.

But when I went to one of them to enquire, they basically told me to let Sarah go. To be precise, they said;

‘Data recovery from a damaged harddisk would cost at least a thousand ringgit.’

And I don’t have that amount to lavish, unfortunately. So, Sarah, this is goodbye. You have been my love and my life for 3 wonderful years. You have given me much joy and made me who I am today. I shall miss you and you will remain on a special seat in my heart forever.

Thank you.