The on the left pictured green opaline budgie was called Mira. In October 1992, he came into my life and terminated the "budgie-break" I had since Pünktchen's death a while ago. When I was passing by a pet shop, I discovered Mira within the little flock that was kept in the store. His lively behavior and the pure joy of living he told by his actions were amazing, so I could not leave the shop without him. In the beginning I thought him to be a budgie hen and he got his female name. A few weeks later he turned out to be a cock. Well, he always carried his female name with pride and didn't seem to be angry with me because of my mistake.

I always planned to go and get a second budgie after having moved to a bigger flat in winter 1993, but everything came different. On 10/18/93, I found the poor neglected and wounded Vela outside in the street, Mira's further fate was decided. He immediately fell in love with the budgie lady who was absolutely scary due to her bad experiences with humans (she had been maltreated). One could see him feeding his beloved wife very often and when she got seriously ill in the end of '95, he fed her all day long. After she recovered, Mira didn't stop from permanently feeding her. By regurgitate his food several times each day, Mira overexcited his mucosa of the crop and he got a heavy infection no medicine could heal. On 06/08/96, my extremely lovable Mira died while he was lying safe in my warm hand.

Vela became very sad after she saw his beloved mate dying and a few weeks later, she died from her grief and followed him to wherever he may have gone to.

Meaning of the name
The name is derived from a star with a variable brightness that can be found in the constellation "Cetus" (that means whale). This star is also called Mira Ceti, and that's the reason why I named Mira's closest friend Ceti.

Mira always loved to drink some tea with me if it was cooled down a bit (see photo below).