ajax send text with indentation

Question

I have a problem with ajax. In the client side i send with ajax a string using tabs(\t) and returns (\n) through GET. The code that i'm using is :

var str = "Lucky \t 21 \n Paul \n 22 \n ";
var url = "loadFile.php?string="+str;
request.open("GET", url, true);
request.onreadystatechange = function () {loadHandler(me)};
overrideMimeType('text/xml');
request.send(null);

The problem is in the server-side ,written in php, when i save the string on a file. I lose all the tabs and returns. How can I have them also on the server side?