July 4, 2025
"Jirachi's Wish is You" ft. Ginger Jirachi | TRAINER'S EYE #172
When you lose everything, what brings you back? For Ginger Jirachi, it was Pokémon and a little wish upon a star.
After a painful divorce and losing nearly everything he collected, Ginger Jirachi rebuilt his life one Pokéstop at a time, powered by Pokémon nostalgia, the warmth of community, and the quiet strength of starting over. From sibling memories and clay-art cards to a wish for Worlds and a newfound path in sobriety, his story reminds us that sometimes, wishes really do come true.
Listen as he shares how the trading card game, Pokémon GO, and one mythical star brought hope back into focus. This is more than a comeback, it’s a celebration of connection, healing, and holding on to joy.
🎧 Listen to heartfelt stories of inclusion, resilience, and connection.
Explore the Pokémon & Disability Stories playlist now!
Sources
Opening Song: "Forget You" by Alex_MakeMusic from Pixabay
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Your next Pokemon adventure begins here!
WEBVTT
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My name is Ginger Jirachi and this is my Pokemon story.
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Welcome to As The Pokeball Turns, where every voice, every journey, and every memory brings us closer to the world of Pokemon.
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I'm David Hernandez and I'm joined by someone who built a space where wonder in warmth, shine just like a shooting star.
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Ginger Jirachi, welcome to the The Pokeball Turns.
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Hey, Hey, glad to thank you.
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Thank you.
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Absolutely.
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And you know, you're the one of the first people I've had on the podcast.
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I told you this before we started that Love Jirachi, and I wanted to start off with a fun question before we dive into the whole Facebook and Jirachi and everything.
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Obviously Jirachi is known as the one who grants wishes.
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So if you could have one wish granted by Jirachi, but it can only be related to your Pokemon journey, what would it be?
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Um,
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You know, that's a tough one.
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the last couple years I've been, really kind of bouncing all over the place with family stuff.
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so I guess my one wish would be, I would really love to go to Worlds someday.
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I haven't been to a whole lot of shows, but I would really, really love to go to Worlds and watch that.
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I think that would probably be my number one wish.
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That's not a bad wish.
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I mean, I think a lot of people kind of wish for that.
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what about Worlds appeals to you?
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Like why Worlds of all things?
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so the, trading card game kind of got me back into Pokemon the last few years.
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I've got three younger brothers and one of them is really into magic.
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so he watches, competitive stuff on YouTube, and he kind of turned me back into the, uh, competitive scene, for Pokemon.
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up probably like 20 14, 20 15.
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It just kind of, uh, rekindled my love for, you know, all the aspects, especially the community.
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I feel like, there's some people who, are very gatekeeper.
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About whatever hobby that may be.
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And, you know, it's surprising that our community does have that, but from the interactions and the people I've met, whether it's locally or online, the vibes are just so good, man.
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so really just like meeting people and, you know, having, a shared love and passion for something.
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And how many different, outlets Pokemon, gives different people, you know, like you've got your thing.
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You know, some people are more into the plushies, you know, the are whatever it is.
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So really just the, the community and the growth, is, cool to me about worlds.
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I remember, the, last Worlds I had to work that entire weekend.
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I was, I was gonna go.
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but work scheduled me, right.
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so that was kind of like my little treat to myself after work, you know, to hop on YouTube and, catch up with, you know, what's going on and, kind of the meta of the different decks and stuff.
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Now you mentioned how you originally were playing Magic, the Gathering.
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And Pokemon and Magic to me are kind of, I'll say distant cousins in a way.
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You know, magic
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Sure.
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Pokemon has the energies.
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They're kind of little similar, but obviously very different games.
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What was it specifically about Pokemon that kind of brought you back?
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Was it the artwork, the strategy?
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Like what is it about the trading card game back in 2014 that kind of brought you back in?
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I would say the art, definitely, big time.
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when I was younger, I was a, a little bit of an artist.
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I still doodle in stuff.
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there some street graffiti, although I didn't just say that.
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Um,
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Um,
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uh.
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Yeah, no, I, I really love the artwork and, that's actually something, I'm considering getting into, is doing like a mini series on, different artists, in the cards and kind of, get into their other works outside of Pokemon.
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But yeah, I'd definitely say the artwork, it just.
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it's such a comfort thing and it's so inspiring.
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Like, especially with, the cutesy Pokemon, like the colors and pastels.
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That really, uh, really, turns my brain on for sure.
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Now, when it comes to the artwork and, you know, we'll get a little artsy side on this side.
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what kind of cards do you enjoy art-wise?
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can you give us some examples of some that kind of stick to you?
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Um, Um,
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I, I love my Jirachi cards.
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That's obviously a given.
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I've really been into the last couple of sets, especially the, Destin rivals.
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it's such a great callback to the actual, like trainer cards and rocket cards from back in the day.
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That was one of the of the first collected when I was younger, with uh, errands money or chore money.
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that was always a really special thing this is dating me a little bit.
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Me and my brothers would, walk up to the local Kmart and, all chip in and get a couple packs together.
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So I'm, I'm really into the new.
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Sets.
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But as far as like, art style wise, my favorite, and I'm, I'm blanking on the artist's name right now, but the cards that look like they're, you know, either made with like clay or that they're crocheted, I just think those cards are so stinking cute.
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And I know they're only like pennies, but I've got, a whole binder of just cute Pokemon just'cause the artwork.
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So Cool.
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Growing up, I watched a lot of, Like stop motion shows, you know, like, the most popular one would be like, nightmare before Christmas to give everybody an idea what, the medium stop motion is like.
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So those cards where, The Pokemon themselves are a real physical thing.
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I think that's probably my favorite art style right now.
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Now you mentioned how Jirachi specifically is one of the favorite Pokemon you have or one of The Pokeball you love.
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what is your connection to Jirachi?
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Like?
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Is it a favorite Pokemon?
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Is there a special memory tied to it?
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I would definitely say it's my favorite Pokemon for sure.
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when that movie came out, I got it from a three pack, DVDI can't remember the other movies that were on it.
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But, wish Maker was one of them, and it was one of the few, DVDs that me and my brothers could agree on.
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We used to, um, yeah, yeah, I know, I know.
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That's funny.
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the oldest brother being like, shut up.
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We're watching Pokemon.
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Yeah, well, I mean, more so'cause the brothers usually fight.
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They, that's kind of amazing.
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You all actually agreed on one movie
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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you know, now that we're older, we all get along, but That's one thing we very much have in common.
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We've, we've been Pokemon fans since the get go.
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I remember when it hit the States in 98.
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That's when my youngest brother was born.
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my grandma went to toys us and got those, uh, oh, how do I describe it?
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Basically just like a, a plastic figurine.
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But they would, talk, you know, it just had like one of those sliding buttons on the bottom and it was.
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Let me think.
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It was Meowth because I ended up getting Meowth cause I guess all the Pikachu had been sold out and it was so new.
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My grandma didn't really know what to get.
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So all four of us boys got our first Pokemon.
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So mine was Meowth.
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I think there we had a Squirtle, Bulbasaur,, and I can't remember the other one.
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There was only like seven or eight in the set.
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From a young age, we were always really into it.
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But as getting back to JIrachi definitely my favorite Pokemon, this again, I'm aging myself here.
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when Ruby and Sapphire version came out, I was one of the only kids that got Sapphire because, I liked the artwork better.
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I, I liked Kyogre more than Groudon, so it kind of worked out.
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'cause I was one of the only kids that had Sapphire.
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So everybody wanted to trade with me.
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And I had this buddy, Zach Green, who, uh, I'm still very close with, to this day.
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Me and him.
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Would trade together.
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So, I guess that would've been the first Pokedex I ever completed.
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Completed at the time, a hundred percent completed it.
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And he was also one of the friends that, his parents are super geeky.
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Like they're, they've always been into like graphic novels and like, they turned me onto like Futurama and stuff like that.
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And, he had the Colosseum, bonus disc.
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to get Jirachi, because, you know, being that young, I think I was maybe, oh gosh, like 11 or 12 at the time around there.
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so I didn't really understand, you know, and it's a whole thing now where it's like the distribution events, it was so hard for me to even consider that a viability, you know?
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'cause I was young and, and I live in the middle of nowhere in Illinois.
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Like my town's only 15,000 people.
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So.
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To have a friend that had the Colosseum bonus disc, me and him both got Jirachi to finish our, sapphire and Ruby Dexes and, yeah, I just remember that being such a fun time in my life.
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Like every morning in the summer, I'd go over, we'd trade, we'd battle all day, all night, and then, uh, when he got that disc, that was just huge because.
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I'd never experienced Pokemon, in multiple, platforms before.
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You know, for me it'd always just been the TV show.
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I'd have grandma record that.
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me and my brothers all shared one Game Boy Advance, or maybe it was two.
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we didn't have a whole lot of money growing up, so to get, a mythical Pokemon via a whole different game system that just like really turned me on.
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And Jirachi You know, super cute.
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and I feel like it's very underrated.
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especially with, the Alpha and Omega stuff, I feel like they really focused on Latias and Latios thing and you know, Jirachi doesn't get a whole lot of love.
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You know, a lot of people really like Deoxys and Rayquaza I'd I, so my opinion, that's the.
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Most popular fandom as far as it goes to gen three, and I feel like Jirachi's just super slept on.
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So, uh, I decided to start my page, I was like, well, that just makes sense.
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Now, you talked about how your brothers, y'all were opening packs, y'all got your figurines.
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Was those early days of, playing Pokemon a competition a way for y'all to bond?
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Or was it kind of a bit of both?
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you know, we didn't really, I didn't learn learn how to actually play the card game until I was probably game until I was in middle school.
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at that time, Yu-gi-oh was the huge thing.
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I was, I was really into Yu-gi-oh but when the meta started shifting, and basically it turned into like a, pay to play thing, you know, even if you had a really great deck, you know, the rich kids had the really good cards, so they'd smoke you.
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so it was never, a competitive thing until later in my life.
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it was more about the collection and, it really helped me make friends.
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I really didn't have friends growing up until, Pokemon.
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cause everybody was into it, you know?
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It was even in this little rural town, it was easier to make friends and, meet people and have conversations.
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They'd see your cards or they'd see you playing your game boy advance and, you know, immediately you'd just make a new friend.
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So it was very much a connective thing, for all of us.
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Like all of my brothers are super into Pokemon.
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We don't, talk a whole lot.
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You know, we're all, spread out over the states and we're grown men now.
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So, you know, we got our careers and, getting ready to start families and stuff like that.
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But I feel like I talk to my brothers every single day and if Pokemon wasn't a factor, I really don't know if that would be the case.
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Well, after gen three, was there any particular generation afterwards or even before that you enjoyed the most?
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So you know, I gotta give love to the OGs.
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The first game, I owned was a, pre-owned yellow version, and it was like a year or two before gen three came out.
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that was a big deal, you know,'cause all my friends they had, gold and silver, and my next door neighbor had Crystal.
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So I guess Crystal would be the first game I ever played.
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but yellow version, I, I still, to this day, I really love yellow version and, you know, gen three obviously my favorite.
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it came out during a time where.
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global warming was becoming, a talking point, you know, even as a kid.
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So I thought that the storyline, it just came out at a perfect time.
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I three is always gonna be top, but I really, and this might be controversial but I preferred Sword and Shield over Scarlet and Violet, I thought.
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That the story was great.
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The new Mons were fantastic.
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Don't get me wrong.
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I, really enjoyed Scarlet Violet, but it had been a long time, you know, basically since gen three I'd say, Sword and Shield, Shield, Snap.
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And then of course, uh, gen three are, those have gotta be my tops.
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Hey you.
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Yes, you with the ears.
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Don't go anywhere.
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We'll be right back.
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Love hearing real stories from real trainers.
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00:12:06.572 --> 00:12:09.581
Now from what you said earlier, you said the trading card games are what brought you back.
00:12:09.581 --> 00:12:11.322
So I'm guessing you took a break at some point
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Mm-hmm.
00:12:11.922 --> 00:12:12.971
Shield or was it before?
00:12:13.424 --> 00:12:13.784
Yeah.
00:12:14.075 --> 00:12:18.725
long story short, I got married and divorced in the same year.
00:12:19.325 --> 00:12:21.274
I don't know if I should say congratulations or I'm sorry.
00:12:21.274 --> 00:12:21.394
It's
00:12:21.485 --> 00:12:22.475
No, no, no.
00:12:22.475 --> 00:12:23.404
Totally her loss.
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It was, uh, we were super young and just, anyway, Not to get into that, but long story short, when we split, I don't know if she sold all my stuff or just like destroyed it, but I had a extensive collection of cards and I used to be really into the plushies, so I had like 20 Pokemon Center exclusive Plushies.
00:12:41.951 --> 00:12:45.437
Uh, so after we split, I kind of had to start from ground one.
00:12:45.740 --> 00:12:47.126
so I moved out of the area.
00:12:47.126 --> 00:12:52.590
And, one of my things to do to, you know, explore the new area and get to know people was, Pokemon Go.
00:12:52.590 --> 00:12:55.289
I've, I've played that literally every day since it came out.
00:12:55.604 --> 00:13:03.427
so I'd say Sword and Shield definitely got me back into it, although Pokemon's been in my life every day since it came to the States.
00:13:03.427 --> 00:13:06.892
So it's kind of hard to say What, quote unquote got me back into it.
00:13:06.892 --> 00:13:15.325
'cause I've always been into it, but I feel, like that relationship change and kind of starting from ground one, as a new journey, you know, I definitely was, very upset.
00:13:15.325 --> 00:13:17.485
You know, that's not an easy thing to go through in life.
00:13:17.544 --> 00:13:20.902
you know, divorced, I didn't think I'd be a part of that demographic, but.
00:13:20.902 --> 00:13:24.381
Showed me, what I'm into the things that I can't live without.
00:13:24.711 --> 00:13:29.849
And I, I'd never felt so, angry and upset after, losing these physical things.
00:13:29.849 --> 00:13:34.318
But the more I thought about it, I was like, it's not that it's physical things, it's'cause it's Pokemon.
00:13:34.318 --> 00:13:39.667
You know, you have such a, bond over it, or at least for me, you know, it's, it's so close to the heart that.
00:13:39.667 --> 00:13:48.234
pushed me a little bit to go, you know what, instead of getting stuck in the mud or, uh, erasing the file or whatever, to, uh, just, start a new game, I guess.
00:13:48.249 --> 00:13:48.489
guess.
00:13:49.403 --> 00:13:57.083
I'll be the first to admit, you know, I've never experienced marriage or divorce, so I can't even fathom what that's like what you went through.
00:13:57.413 --> 00:14:07.823
But from what you told me, it sounds like you have such a mixed emotions at the time because obviously'cause a lot of things happen within a year, those are two life changing events for anybody and,
00:14:08.078 --> 00:14:08.528
Yeah.
00:14:08.663 --> 00:14:13.283
it's kind of amazing just to see how you were able to find people through Pokemon.
00:14:13.644 --> 00:14:15.173
In this case, Pokemon Go.
00:14:15.399 --> 00:14:18.190
What did it mean to find connection again through Pokemon Go?
00:14:18.644 --> 00:14:21.246
You know, it was, everything, for a while.
00:14:21.326 --> 00:14:29.567
you know, a after me and my ex split, I got a job opportunity up in the suburbs and, you know, I basically started from square one.
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You know, I didn't know anybody.
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I was couch surfing for a little bit.
00:14:32.626 --> 00:14:37.601
a And, You know, after work and stuff I'd go to the pub or you know, wherever, you know, get a bite to eat.
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And I was surprised at how many adults like me, me, know, in the suburbs there's tons of Pokestops, right?
00:14:43.696 --> 00:14:44.431
So like, right?
00:14:44.431 --> 00:14:50.385
So like, everybody I met was into it of their own fruition or'cause their kids were super into it.
00:14:50.696 --> 00:14:53.936
so I, I gotta connect, with a lot of my clients that way.
00:14:53.936 --> 00:14:56.576
Meeting new friends, you know, just totally random people.
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I'd see'em on their phone.
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I'm like, I'm yo, aby is a friend.
00:14:59.365 --> 00:15:09.999
You know, or you do, you need a trade it was pretty incredible how quickly I gained, new friendships and new connections just through go initially.
00:15:10.157 --> 00:15:13.611
you know, after the split it that, it was really, really tough.
00:15:13.912 --> 00:15:15.922
I didn't think I'd be able to start over again.
00:15:15.922 --> 00:15:20.208
I thought, all my friends aren't gonna, you know, they're not gonna rock with me anymore, yada, yada.
00:15:20.515 --> 00:15:31.436
learned very quickly that that was kind of the opposite, you know, the community and people that are into Pokemon are just so welcoming and, you know, a lot of times we don't wanna talk about the serious stuff and Pokemon's kind of an outlet.
00:15:31.511 --> 00:15:35.668
for That, you know, whether it's a comfort thing or if it, motivates you.
00:15:35.908 --> 00:15:37.948
So I'd say yeah, through go.
00:15:37.991 --> 00:15:43.782
that was honestly, I know it sounds so silly, but it was, it at that time in my life, it was a genuine lifesaver.
00:15:43.782 --> 00:15:48.629
Like I was just going through so much and go, got me out of bed in the morning.
00:15:48.951 --> 00:15:53.385
You know, I had something to look forward to, even though it's, you know, quote unquote just a video game.
00:15:53.921 --> 00:15:57.941
it really helped me push myself and, you know, tell myself, Hey, this isn't the end.
00:15:57.941 --> 00:16:03.884
You know, it sucks right now, But you'll get through this and you got a lot of friends and you know, your team's never gonna ditch you.
00:16:03.884 --> 00:16:04.408
So, you.
00:16:04.509 --> 00:16:05.293
So yeah.
00:16:06.313 --> 00:16:12.313
it sounds like, of course, your friends were just, the way they grounded you during your time, during a time when your life was just full of turmoil.
00:16:12.433 --> 00:16:12.734
Yeah.
00:16:12.884 --> 00:16:13.063
you
00:16:13.124 --> 00:16:13.604
Oh yeah.
00:16:14.083 --> 00:16:18.793
day or kind of a moment that made you, I guess, realize that these people are your people?
00:16:19.236 --> 00:16:19.807
Yeah.
00:16:19.807 --> 00:16:25.311
I guess the, first one that really kind of smacked me in the face was, uh, I guess I didn't say what I do for work.
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Hey you.
00:11:34.092 --> 00:11:35.743
Yes, you with the ears.
00:11:36.043 --> 00:11:37.123
Don't go anywhere.
00:11:37.332 --> 00:11:38.533
We'll be right back.
00:11:40.125 --> 00:11:42.225
Love hearing real stories from real trainers.
00:11:42.585 --> 00:11:47.955
Help As The Pokeball turns become the best Pokemon interview podcast like no one ever was.
00:11:48.554 --> 00:11:51.554
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00:11:51.705 --> 00:11:54.195
You're helping more fans share their journeys with the world.
00:11:54.735 --> 00:12:00.075
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00:12:00.644 --> 00:12:05.115
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