I went on holiday twice since I bought my tiel and he remembered me very well when I came back. Both our reunions were very emotional.
However I was worried too, so I understand you.

Awe! These stories are beautiful! I never thought that a human would still be in a birds minds for 15 years! That's insane! I feel better now!

My friend has broken a couple of rules, one of them involved not letting other people touch them, he made a party and everybody held my birds. He took pictures and said: "Your birdies have new friends now, they've forgotten about you" and then he sent pictures of everybody holding them.

But then again, I'm greatful he's not just storing them as Carolyn once pointed out.

Well Vlad DOES get to see him at least once a year, so it's not like he went without seeing him for 15 years and never forgot. But Vlad doesn't see him for very many days out of the year, so I'm surprised that he still remembers.

It's not a bad thing for your birds to be handled by other people, as long as the people do it properly and don't upset the birds. When it's done right, it teaches the birds that it's safe for them to interact with other people besides you. It can be fun when people visit your house and you can invite them to play with your birds, and the birds enjoy it instead of being scared.

Still, saying something like "they've forgotten about you" is kinda rude mean. And if I were him, I would follow your rules to the best of my ability.

In fact Erik, if you need someone to watch your birds for you next time you're here, I don't mind doing it as long as you don't mind dragging them across the border.

Lol, I'm gonna end up in jail

There's more to it than Erik ending up in jail lol. You can't just bring parrots across the border. Mexico doesn't care what people bring in and doesn't check, so it's easy to take pet birds into Mexico. But the US very definitely does care. To bring them in legally involves a lot of complications including a 90-day quarantine. If you try to smuggle them in and get caught, the birds will be confiscated and probably destroyed. The human will face a fine at the very least, and jail is a definite risk.

What exactly is Smuggling?

I know, that's why I haven't done it.. It is extremely dangerous to traffic things from there to here, as well as it is very illegal. I would love to transport him here legally, but again it's very difficult and my babes could be destroyed. So that's a no-no for me.

Why would they kill an animal just because you illegally brought it over?

Because it's illegal. They warn you first, and if you still do it, you face the consequences.