Ojciec Mateusz Riding a Bike

Submission 1,058

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About

Ojciec Mateusz Riding a Bike, also known as Father Matthew Riding a Bike or known in Polish as Ojciec Mateusz na Rowerze, refers to video recreations of the Polish television character Ojciec Mateusz riding a bicycle. In the show, Ojciec Mateusz is a priest and he rides his bike often. In early 2023, Polish TikTokers started recreating the scenes in their own videos, additionally playing classical music made by the composer Michał Lorenc from the show's soundtrack out of a speaker when they passed by the camera. The Ojciec Mateusz TikTok trend spread outside of Polish TikTok into the feeds of English-speaking users where it gained more virality in May 2023.

Origin

The television show Ojciec Mateusz premiered on Polish television on December 7th, 2008.^[1] The show was a Polish rendition of the then-popular Italian TV show Don Matteo.^[1] In multiple scenes of the show, Ojciec Mateusz would ride his bicycle, often paired with one of the show's main themes called "Ojciec Mateusz" made by Polish composer Michał Lorenc (YouTube^[2] upload shown below).

Due to the show's notoriety in Poland, Polish internet users were inherently conscious of Ojciec Mateusz riding a bicycle in association with the aforementioned, orchestral song. Currently, the first discovered recreation of Ojciec Mateusz riding a bicycle in an internet video was uploaded on February 7th, 2013, by YouTuber^[2] jarosław rybicki who seemingly filmed a stranger riding a bike in front of their car, setting the video to Michał Lorenc's song. YouTuber^[2] jarosław rybicki titled the video, "prawie jak ojciec mateusz," translating into English as, "almost like father matthew." The video received roughly 1,900 views in 10 years (shown below).

Despite an early 2010s origin, mega-viral videos of the trend didn't surface until the 2020s on TikTok. For instance, the first-known, viral TikTok that recreated Ojciec Mateusz riding a bike was uploaded on October 1st, 2021, by TikToker^[3] @ciapatedisco2, gaining roughly 541,500 plays and 101,300 likes in one and a half years (shown below).

Spread

On March 28th, 2022, TikToker^[4] @_ojciec_mateusz._ uploaded a clip from the TV show of Ojciec Mateusz riding a bike with Michał Lorenc's song playing, gaining roughly 84,600 plays and 3,100 likes in one year (shown below, left). On June 16th, 2022, TikToker^[5] @adix_sdb used @_ojciec_mateusz._'s TikTok sound to recreate the video, earning roughly 22,500 plays and 1,000 likes in 11 months (shown below, right).

In early 2023, the trend became more viral on TikTok. For instance, on April 11th, 2023, TikToker^[6] @kacper55__ uploaded an iteration that received roughly 5 million plays and 741,800 likes in one month (shown below, left). Thereafter, various, viral iterations surfaced, such as one uploaded by TikToker^[7] @mariuszek_1200 on April 17th, 2023, which received roughly 3.6 million plays and 468,700 likes in three weeks (shown below, right).

In the comment sections of both aforementioned TikToks,^[6]^[7] many English-speaking users portrayed curiosity over the trend's meaning.