PALLET TOWN – Once hailed as a local legend for taming a horribly misbehaved Pikachu, Ash Ketchum has given up on his initial goal of ‘catching ‘em all’ citing financial reasons. Ash began his journey 5 years ago on a scholarship from Prof Oak, the local Pokémon expert. One of the terms of the scholarship was catching every Pokémon in the Kanto region and winning the Pokémon League. However, Ash was miserable in the Pokémon League and only caught 52 out of 151 Pokémon prompting him to request an academic extension. In the words of Prof Oak, “I expected so much from Ash, but he has disappointed me in every possible way including being barbequed by his Charizard who outright refuses to listen to him. However, I still granted him an academic extension to travel to the Johto region. If he doesn’t get more pages in the Pokédex published by then, he would not be allowed to continue on the scholarship.”
Fast forward a few episodes, Ash failed to satisfactorily complete the duties required by his program in the Johto region leading to his scholarship being revoked. Then he took a student loan to travel to Hoenn, Sinnoh, Unova, and beyond to be able to fulfill his childhood dream i.e. catching ‘em all. Unfortunately, debt-ridden Ash is unable to afford more Pokéballs. Being a horrible Pokémon trainer, he is also unable to catch a Pokémon in the first attempt causing a shortage of Pokéballs every now and then in his backpack. When The Sundial interviewed Ash, he said “the student debt situation in Pokémon world is f*ckin’ horrible” while devouring the last bit of Pokémon food that he has to share with his dependent Pokémon due to financial constraints. He further added, “I should have dropped out of Pokémon training years ago. But it is what it is now.”
The Sundial also interviewed Brock, Ash’s travel companion and project partner in the first semester who now works as a graduate student in Prof. Oak’s lab and is studying to be a future Pokémon Doctor. He blatantly refused to comment on his student debt situation. Another graduate student at Prof Oak’s lab hinted that Brock was obsessed with rock type Pokémon and was washed out of many Pokémon fights by Misty’s incredible water-type Pokémon causing him to drop out of the conventional Pokémon training job market and rather pursue a very narrow field in grad school. In fact, his records show an even poorer performance compared to Ash. The Sundial suspects that his poor performance may be indicative of exorbitant student debt piling over his undergraduate years and the possible reason why he refused to comment on his debt situation.
Written by Yuvraj Singh, Staff Writer