From Karachi’s crowded markets and Kabul’s alleys to Australia’s vast sky: budgies are for me fragments of memory

‘Just like me, the birds had different lives in different geographies: bartered and caged in one, woven into street lore in another and, finally, here, unshackled, their wings stretching fully into the air they were born for.’ writes Shadi Khan Saif. Photograph: Tim Phillips Photos/Getty Images

My first encounter with what we then called “Australian parrots” came two decades ago in Karachi’s Victorian-era Empress Market, a sprawling landmark where the smell of turmeric and cardamom drifted through arched hallways. Amid that sensory storm, one corner was always a riot of colour and sound: traders hawking cages crammed with budgerigars.

“Budgies”, as I would later learn to call them, were auctioned off in the sticky heat of Friday mornings. It was the time when Pakistan was still observing Friday as the weekly day off. The bird’s popularity was unmatched: hardy, inexpensive and adorned in flashes of yellow, green and blue, they were the undisputed crowd favourites.