While Pokemon GO may be getting harder to play and seeing a decline in interest, it’s undeniable that Pokemon fever is still very much in full swing, especially with some territories only seeing the game recently launched. On Thursday, Norway’s Prime Minister, Erna Solberg, proved as much when she whipped out her smartphone between meetings to hunt down some wild Pokemon and hatch some eggs. She was not looking for Pokemon on her home turf, however; despite not being in the European Union, Norway has very close ties to it. Thus, Solberg found herself on the streets of the Slovakian city of Bratislava (where some preliminary Brexit talks are taking place). When those proceedings took a break, so did Solberg. With bodyguards around her, she stepped out into the figurative tall grass and gave in to the temptation to sling some Poke Balls.
Solberg, being an opportunistic mobile gamer, had seemingly found her new love after Candy Crush Saga. Reportedly, Solberg had given two interviews only the day before, where she was asked if she played the game and said that she did not. Later on that same day, reports detail that her sister found a Pokemon on Solberg’s veranda during a visit and showed her how the game worked. Her sister issued her a challenge to simply try the game out and see if she liked it, and that was all it took to convince the Prime Minister to take her first steps beyond the bounds of Pallet Town.
TV crews showed the world that the Prime Minister was a Pokemon GO player, airing footage of Solberg and her bodyguards walking about the streets between sessions and netting wild Pokemon. Speaking with news network TV2 about her adventures in Bratislava, Solberg maintained that catching the Pokemon roaming the streets of the Slovakian city was her secondary concern within the confines of the game world; mainly, she was trying to rack up distance and hatch some eggs, which nets players tons of XP and stardust, and often yields rare Pokemon. It is also the only way to get region-exclusive Pokemon without travelling.