Tragedies

Rain on Highway 401

Sometimes I think of someone I knew in the past whom I haven’t been in touch for ages and I’d do a Google search on them, just to see how they’re doing. It’s always good to know when I found that they are doing well. They might not remember me anymore, but I’d be happy for them nonetheless. The last two of such searches I did, however, didn’t bring up very pleasant results.

The first search I did was on a really nice girl I knew from when I was still “blogging” at Diaryland about 7 years ago. Her name was Jenny and she had a diary called Sheepish. This Flickr photoset of her Diaryland artwork came up among the search results, and in the description, the words “in memoriam” caught my eye. Further search revealed that she was murdered in May 2003.

Jenny’s diary always had attractive designs. In fact, she was one of my earliest influences in web design. I always wanted to be able to design as well as she did. We read each other’s diary, and whenever I sounded down, she’d write me an email to try to cheer me up. It saddens me to know that she was no longer around and that she had to die such a tragic death.

The second search I did was on a family friend, a well-known Indonesian artist/painter who, as far as I knew, lived in Yogyakarta, where the recent earthquake was. I just wanted to see if he was okay. This obituary turned up among the results. He already died two years ago, in December 2004. Apparently, his health declined after his gallery caught fire and he lost everything.

I remember visiting his gallery many, many years ago when I was a little girl with my parents and brothers. He was a very friendly man. My parents were really fond of him and I think the feeling was mutual because he gave them a few of his paintings for free. His gallery was obviously his pride and joy. The fire was a tragedy, as was his death.

Learning that someone you knew and liked had died is never easy. I hope they both rest in peace.

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Categorised as Life

9 comments

  1. Man, that’s tragic. Sorry to hear that. Anyway, can you imagine this? Just say, you managed to have regular contacts with him. Do you think that tragedy still happened? Do you believe that such human contact can drive the faith into another direction?

  2. I’ve had that happen on two occasions. In both cases it was quite a shock. One was a childhood friend with whom I lost touch when we went off to different universities. I just missed contacting him while he was still alive.
    The other was an old friend who I always thought would go on to accomplish great things. I still think that would have been true had she lived longer.
    That is the wonder of the Internet, though, and Google in particular. You can find people from your past.
    I found a number of my old college friends and we are now in touch and sometimes visit one another. We’re separated by space, but that’s about it. There’s telephone and, of course, email.

  3. Hi, I accidently find your web and I love it, you are a smart girl,nice to know that you originaly from some place as me.
    Nice job girl, and thanks
    I love you template, could you help me make nice template like you have?

  4. Two tragedies for one soul it is a lot of. You the strong girl, good and beautiful blog, in which are possible much поучится.

  5. hello Firda,
    Sorry about what happened to your friend. You really miss them a lot. BTW, I love very much reading your blog especially the design. Where did you learn to design the web.. I tried to re-design one template, played around with the codes, then end up with no hope. I wish I can make one, so far I am hanging around in some websites offering free templates. I tried your template generator.. any chance to get the code from teh generator. Oh, I live in Calgary.. well I just moved here from Jakarta in 2004. Can I link your web?

  6. Indeed, it’s tragical stories. But still it’s far of better for now, as for google did the main stream, and keep everything in hand.

  7. this world is tearing to pieces, its a wonder how much longer we will be here … and to what purpose

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