Issue Index

Original Features

Practical

Food & Drink

Travel

Style

Music

Illustration by Yukiko Leitch

A few days ago one of my relatives phoned and asked me about Pokemon. The cartoon show spawned a playing card game "that is so popular with children," my relative explained to me, "that it has been banned at some schools and is very hard to find! So please bring some small trinkets when you come visit."

Now, I know that most foreigners think the water tastes different here in Tokyo, but is there not something in the air, too? As the ever-materialistic Japanese Christmas/New Year's season draws closer, the madness in the air for Pokemon paraphernalia will only heighten. Parents and aunts and uncles everywhere beware the cute lure of this cartoon series. Here's why: Let's assume that your child is a fantastic negotiator and after an intense session of puppy dog eyes, you agree to buy one new Pokemon character a week. Even at this incredible rate it would take nearly three years to get all of the originally released 151 characters! Of course, this doesn't include any specially created second-generation characters. Once the maddening little devils have their hooks in, it will be a very long gift-giving season.

I knew that the show and characters were huge in Japan, but banned at schools in the States? I decided to head to the Pokemon headquarters to investigate these pernicious creatures. My next day off landed on a recent holiday and so I headed for the same place as godzillions of other children and their parents.

I dragged one of my friends along and as we neared the front entrance we saw The Line. The three abreast lineup went to the corner and just as we thought we were at the end, it snaked around and went another half a block! I asked the Japanese girl holding the End of the Line sign how long it would be. "About 45 minutes," she replied.

Employees of the store walked The Line, wearing yellow jackets and sporting secret agent-like earpieces. As we neared the front, we saw people taking pictures of the crowded entranceway. Wahoo! It was in sight!

We were finally allowed in. Parents with their children were everywhere. I swam through the knee-high patrons to check out the stuff my relatives had requested. There were signs on items limiting purchases to ten. Wow! I decided I had better check with the clan back home before I actually bought anything. It turned out to be a good idea because the line to get to one of the tills was a ten-minute wait! We finally emerged from the store to see a CNN camera setting up to take footage of the crowd.

Good luck to parents and children everywhere finding the latest and greatest Pokemon trading cards, cause it's war out there. Oh, and please try to leave some stuff for the rest of us waiting in The Line.

Many thanks to reader Craig Olson for this Rant.