I was talking with somebody yesterday and she mentioned that a few years back when she was flying to Poland from Chicago, the in-flight entertainment included cartoons about a goat and two stick figures. It was a LOT flight, she added.
A goat? Two stick figures? (That one I very quickly determined to be Bolek i Lolek).

Upon further questioning, it turned out that the goat had a bundle on a stick and was traveling the world. OK, that was easy. The goat with the bundle traveling the world, no doubt wanted to find Pacanów, where they supposedly make goat shoes (like horse shoes, but for goats). The goat, of course, was Koziołek Matołek. The story of Koziołek Matołek is a Polish classic. I remember it mainly from the cartoon series and needless to say, I was mighty surprised that LOT would select it as part of their in-flight entertainment. But hey, anything is possible with LOT.

The Koziołek Matołek animated series is based on a comic book created by Kornel Makuszyński. Actually more than one book, from what I could figure out, there were four of them altogether.

But what the woman I spoke to about Koziołek Matołek wanted to know was if what her seat mate told her was really true. She wasn’t sure how to phrase this question politely and at the same time don’t end up looking like an idiot in case the information she got was wrong. She went around like this:

“And what about this Pacanów? Is it a real town?”
Anna: “Yes, it is. Though I’ve never been there.”
She: “And people aren’t embarrassed to live there?”
Anna: “Why would they be?”
She: “Well, you know, living in a place with such a goofy name…”
Anna (who figured out where this was going): “No, not all of them are stupid.”
She: “So it IS true!”

Yes, what she wanted to know was if the word “pacan” really was a synonym for “stupid”. And yes, the word “matoł” also signifies a person who’s not all that bright.

Hmmm…

Personally, I’ve never liked Koziołek Matołek. It just wasn’t my kind of animated TV series. And no, I don’t know what came first. Whether “matoł” and “pacan” had always meant what they meant and that’s why Mr. Makuszyński used them in the story. Or whether they became synonyms for “stupid” after the birth of Koziołek Matołek. That I really don’t know.

The good people of Pacanów even got themselves a statue of the famous cartoon goat…