PELHAM, N.Y. -- Pikachu, Jigglypuff and the other mutating monsters on the Pokemon juggernaut are running into roadblocks at grade schools around the country.
The hot-selling trading cards that capitalize on the Japanese cartoon phenomenon have been banned, restricted or discouraged by some principals in New York, New Jersey, Washington and elsewhere because they're distracting the early reading set.In Pelham, just north of New York City, all four grade schools have come down in some fashion on the cards, which have sold in the millions since they came out in January.
"They seem to be the latest craze, and the children are beginning to become obsessed by them," said Gerard Finelli, the principal at Colonial school. Finelli has banned trading between pupils "because some of our younger suckered out of their more valuable cards."
The cards are banned entirely at Prospect Hill school, where principal Richard Limato said, "We were having instances in which the children were losing them and then getting very upset."
Kevin Wolski, a second-grader at Colonial, has about 60 of the cards, a poster illustrating all 150 of the sometimes cuddly, sometimes scary monsters, a Pokemon comic book, a T-shirt and a pin. The 7-year-old doesn't bring his cards to school anymore because "the teachers don't like it, and the principal said he'd better not catch us trading."