KARACHI: Never thought I’d see a Diglett pop up in a street off Karachi’s Abdullah Haroon Road on a cloudy Saturday afternoon. But then, you never know.

A Diglett is a brown Pokémon that seems to be mostly underground with just its head sticking out. It has beady black eyes, a pink nose and if it’s exposed to the sun, its blood will heat up and cause it to grow weak.

This is one of the 151 Pokémon characters that a group of students and professionals got together to catch via Pokémon Go on a Super Savari Express (SSE) tour led by two friends and medical students, Ibrahim Hassan and Ali Lari, along with Jehanzeb Salim. Pokémon Go is a free augmented reality game app which uses your GPS location to guide you to Pokémon, and Poké stops.

“It’s been two weeks since Pokémon Go came out,” says Hassan. “A friend of mine mentioned it at university and we decided to get it,” he explains, adding that once they downloaded the app, they spent the entire day catching Pokémon.

“Initially, when you download the app on your smartphone, you find Pokémon everywhere — your bed, the bathroom — but as you level up it gets harder,” he says.

Lari prefers to be called a Pokémon trainer. “This game is basically about walking about town. You need to get out and go places,” he says, adding that there are a lot of people in the city who are interested in the game. “We want to get people together and play the game in its true essence,” he elaborates, adding that he is a dentistry student who has been skipping school to catch Pokémon. “This game is for people to get out, walk about — and you can’t do that here without a group of people.”

This is what the friends are trying to accomplish with the SSE tour every Saturday that costs Rs1,500.

“The game hasn’t launched here [in Pakistan] officially, so it’s not available on the App Store as yet,” Lari explains. “But if you’re an iPhone user, you can use your friends’, cousins’ or someone’s US iTunes account or change the region of your store to the US to download the app as it’s free.” For Android users, he adds, it’s much easier, as there is an app called APK: “Download that app and it will help you download the game. There are a lot of people in Pakistan who are sharing their username with others so they can join in on the fun.”

Salim, a veteran SSE guide, explains that they decided to take on this tour as it fit in with their concept: “This is to take people out to see their city,” he says, adding that SSE is the first guided tour of Karachi and offers people a platform to get to know the city together.

After catching Diglett, we go to Kabootar Chowk near the Sindh Assembly building. On the way there, the guides tell everyone on the bus to swipe left when they spot Poké stops or tap when they see a Pokémon. From there, we head to Frere Hall, Bin Qasim Park and Sea View beach.

“There’s a Charmander (a Pokémon character) in the area! Everyone, there’s a CHARMANDER HERE,” shout Taha Akram and Rameez, who are sitting in the front of the bus. The former, a medicine student, says he started playing Pokémon Go on July 8 and is addicted. So far, he has caught more than 400 Pokémon of 72 different types.

“The most important thing is combat points,” he explains. “The higher the combat points, the stronger your Pokémon,” adding that in the game there are three teams — Mystic (blue), Valour (red) and Instinct (yellow). “You exchange Pokémon for stuff which helps you power up and evolve your Pokémon.” At Poké stops, he adds, you can get Poké balls, eggs and potions to heal Pokémon.

While trying to understand how this game works, I miss the opportunity to catch two rare Pokémon. However, I do end up with Wild Cubone, Doduo, Growlithe, Onix, Sandshrew, Ekans and Charmander.

How does one attract more Pokémon, I ask the guides. According to Hassan, you can use lure modules, which help attract rare Pokémon. It seems you can either buy it or level up. Alternatively, this can also be done using incense, another potion.

Shaharyar Khan, who runs a startup website for homecooks, tells me: “Since we’re in Pakistan, I think we get more ground type Pokémon that can be found in arid climates, like Sandshrew etc.”

Zoha, who started playing the game last week, complains that she is always out of Poké balls. While the guides had warned us to not waste more than three balls on a Pokémon, Zoha said that she kept trying to catch the Pokémon and missed because they kept bouncing.

Sami, 12, says that he caught 32 Pokémon while Zy, 13, said he caught 42 and enjoyed searching for Pokémon while getting to know the city’s historical sites.

Towards the end of the tour, one of the guides turns to Akram, who is complaining that he hadn’t caught as many Pokémon as he thought he would: “Kya baat hai boy, are you gonna catch ‘em all today?”

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2016