Pokemon Go fever is alive and well in Myanmar since it launched over the weekend all over Southeast Asia.
But alas, the game is already bumping up against tradition in this heavily Buddhist country as players go wherever they can to catch Clefairy, pick up Pikachu or chance on a Charizard.
Including inside a pagoda.
A video posted on Facebook purports to show a pagoda in Yangon asking players to leave over a loudspeaker.
“Young people who are playing mobile games in the pagoda compound, please kindly leave from the front side of the pagoda (or Buddha Image) so as not to disturb the prayers,” the broadcast said, according to a version of the broadcast posted by the uploader of the video.
It’s not clear where the pagoda is located, but the video, whose authenticity could not be independently confirmed, went up on Tuesday.
Pagodas are far from the only religious structures to attract players in Myanmar.
Huddled gaming masses have been seen at St. Mary’s Church in downtown Yangon, and a local mosque in the same area, not to mention more secular institutions like City Hall and Mahabandoolah Park, which is fast becoming a big draw for the Pokemon faithful.
So far the government here has been quiet on the game, but things could be headed in the same directionas neighboring Thailand, where the ruling junta has banned it from army barracks and warned that it isn’t compatible with Thailand’s not so friendly sidewalks, or what a spokesman called the country’s “walking culture.”
Elsewhere in the region and beyond, players have also been asked to stay away from a genocide memorial in Cambodia, and a site for atomic bomb victims in Japan.
