以待客之道來說，希臘人真是對來賓很好，真誠熱心，即使自己再窮也一定要請客，必盡地主之誼，讓我實在有點慚愧。試過走到半山腰，拿著一蘿柑的農夫硬要塞兩個柑給我。問路雖然經常牛頭不對馬嘴，但當地人莫不熱心幫助。但是在大城巿如雅典、Heraklion 裏，又時常碰上希臘人吵架，撞車爭執，和中國人真有幾番相似。

家庭式的生意很可愛。Heraklion 酒店老闆娘給客人弄的早餐，是新鮮的蛋和蕃茄，後院種的蕃茄，雞剛下的蛋。兒子也在酒店幫手打理，還開車接載客人。Milos, Santorini 小島風光，實在美不勝收。Santorini 似乎太遊客區了些，房子都新刷的油漆。但白底藍色和海天一色，即使一早曾在網上見過圖片，看見真的風光，還是讚嘆不已。Milos 的驚濤駭浪，也是頭一次感受，才明白何以地中海的風，八個方向，各有名字，溫馴暴烈各有不同。同行的 P ，老頑童也，六十歲，雖然膝有患，游泳迅速，攀石不懼風浪急，吾雖年青，遠不如也！小島浪大，高至一米有餘，攀海邊岩石時，四手皆用，浪高時沒至頂，全身淹於水中，幾乎是半游半爬。水清天藍，小魚游於石縫間，奇石多色。

希臘人極愛大自然，而且敢於探索冒險，不難去的地方不去。而且 P 熟悉地理和化學，一邊走一邊向我解說，這是銅、是鐵、是硫磺，一邊說一邊忍不住收集漂亮的石頭。我中學時所學的化學早忘記得七七八八，慚愧也。食魚，魚大如面盆，野菜，茄子，白芝士，希臘一些菜式其實和意大利相通，如 souvlaki, pita bread 等等則和土耳其菜類似。但希臘菜獨特處，在於無不加上大量檸檬、橄欖油、香草，開胃而不油膩也。

希臘是整個歐洲我第一次發現有凍咖啡的國家，Frappe 的泡沫咖啡實在很特別，但老實說這裏不介意用即溶咖啡，不似法國意大利那麼注重咖啡的香味和質素也。乳酪甚厚，有如忌廉，加以蜜糖進食，也是西歐所無。

常常覺得文化習俗是無法學到的，像聖誕節對於天主教基督教國家來說，是家人團聚的日子。在英國聖誕節商鋪大多關門。香港卻只學得了皮毛，聖誕節只見商場購物，卻沒有一家團聚的意思。我們一家團聚的日子是農曆新年。而復活節是東正教最重要的節日，也是一家團聚的日子，在這裏復活節比聖誕節更重要。他們會烤全羊，傳統上以羔羊供奉上帝。山頂上還真的掛了三個十字架，釘上耶穌和另外兩人的圖畫，週五把耶穌放下。教堂外有XP（希臘文的基督符號）及二魚的圖案。

週六，近午夜，到教堂聽彌撒。入教堂人們會親吻耶穌及聖母畫像。在他們來說，不拜偶像的意思，只是不拜雕塑，畫像是可以的。午夜一過，人們相吻祝福，一方說：祂復活了，另一方答：對，真的。然後放炮仗，放煙花。炮仗就在身邊，震耳欲襲。之後 P & M 帶了我去他友人家，吃羊肝粥，復活蛋。蛋染通紅，象徵寶血。吃前先互相敲對方蛋殼，比賽看看誰的蛋先破。P 是科學人，他是無神論者。M 是教古希臘神話的老師，但也是虔誠的正教信徒。我問神話與一神相沖否？答曰：在希臘，兩者有如傳統，從來不覺得諸神和一神有衝突也。

週日，同觀村民燒猶大布偶，乃每年習俗，有如打小人。全村盡出，幾百人圍觀。那布偶大小有如真人，內裝豆子，他們把希臘總理的照片貼在猶大身上，認為他出賣希臘人利益，是猶大也。烘烘烈火，有如中世紀燒死女巫那樣，看得我這個外人有點不安。但似乎他們大人小孩如常嘻笑，對他們來說只是掃除厄運，圖個好意頭。

據說希臘債務危機，很多人失業欠債，前景一片灰暗。歐盟雖然承諾援助，卻要求希臘一定要緊縮開支；但緊縮開支，必定導致醫療、教育受挫，對勉救經濟更為不利。而且政府高層多貪污，低下層卻受衝擊最大。其它歐洲國家認為希臘人懶惰，實則就我所見，希臘人甚勤奮也，惜公司、店鋪多倒閉，即使勤奮者亦無處可工作。

根據 P 的講法，他覺得西方的文明是 give and take，會比較計較，比較著重個人利益。他甚至認為英美都不是真正的民主也。然而希臘人的著重家庭，不計較，為人隨便，請客是禮節，有點像中國人。我想會不會是因為這樣，一切變得難以量化，也難以劃清人情和貪污的界線。

在這裏罷工是平常事，每星期都有工人罷工。這星期就有船員罷工，我也因此要臨時重新訂酒店和改船票。試想想船期改動，很多旅客就無法在復活期回家或旅行，影響的生意豈止船公司，還有許多小島的酒店和店鋪。但似乎 P 也很同情這些工人，不介意有人罷工也。

其中一程船，浪高兩三米，上下搖擺得有如海盜船，浪高時蓋過窗口。船員似乎見怪不怪，一早派定嘔吐袋，我和大多數人一樣，嘔得天翻地覆，面青唇白。連續搖擺四十多分鐘，不禁想到 Titanic 的沉船，日本的海嘯，古希臘時代 Santorini (Thera) 因為火山爆發整個小島被埋。想想有可能葬生於此了，腦海飄過家人的樣子，朋友的樣子，一生見過的美女的樣子，唸唸心經。但可能這種風浪對於他們很平常吧。或許正是這樣貼近諸般自然奇景，天氣多變，才孕育出許多神話。

雅典，城市大得可怕，和羅馬、倫敦大小相似，遊客區絢麗處可比歐洲其它城巿。然貧困的地區殘舊處卻似大陸二十年前，乞丐露宿者處處。交通之混亂，亦如意大利也。但即使是遊客區，希臘人亦甚老實，不會開天殺價，不似意國那樣好像專賺遊客錢，可敬也。鐵騎剷上行人路，轉右不顧行人，習以為常。斜路急彎轉角處，路旁常常放著迷你教堂，原來是曾經發生交通事故，有人死傷，路祭之處也。又或者死不去，感恩而設廟也。廣場處流浪貓狗甚多。地上的雲石多有缺口，據說是示威者拿去碎片，用來攻擊防暴警察也。激進暴力，豈是香港可比？

古希臘樂器博物館，入夜將閉館，只有我一人，然而館長卻熱情介紹每件樂器，細談其歷史神話，此等好導賞前所未遇也。亦看近代之希臘民間樂器，似頗受中東影響也。館長推介，得 Bouzouki 唱片一，甚喜之。常常在的士裏、酒店裏打開電視就是傳統音樂，或者帶有傳統樂器的流行曲，可見希臘的傳統音樂是他們生活一部份。現在希臘的民間音樂和保加利亞、羅馬利亞有相似之處，和古希臘似乎關係不明顯。希臘的民間傳統服裝，其實亦和巴爾幹半島諸國相似。

俄羅斯及各斯拉夫語系國家，文字以 Cyrillic 字母書寫，而實際上 Cyrillic 最初是脫始於中古希臘文。而且東歐諸國系出東正教同源，是以整個東歐的文化較相近。反而西歐對東歐的認識真的很少很少，完全不認識東正教的事。西歐人對希臘的興趣，也僅止於古希臘文化，以及陽光與海灘，誠可惜也。希臘中世紀至今的歷史，獨立戰爭、巴爾幹戰爭、兩次大戰的破壞，我幾乎一無所知。

有一個疑惑，是今天的希臘人和古希臘人的血統到底有幾分相同？因為今天的希臘人，和意大利南部的人，以至和中東的人，外貌近似。反而古希臘的雕塑，看起來像日耳曼人，何解會如此？又或者，今天的中國人，和秦兵馬俑，看起來也有點不同。秦代士兵一個個高大威猛，古希臘雕塑一個個肌肉健碩，五官端正，不知是美化了還是真實。現代希臘人似乎頗為依賴車輛，頗多肥胖者，不復似古希臘之強壯。

從雅典坐五小時火車至奧林匹斯山區 Meteora。寺院建於中古，屹立崖上，雄偉非凡。吊橋進寺，有如恆山懸空寺。吊繩載人，則似黑木崖也。得覽經文，觀其獨特樂譜。可能因為西歐古典音樂的源於天主教的教堂音樂，以至於我們學音樂歷史，Early Music 主要也是指西歐的音樂。但其實 Byzantine 的音樂極其豐富，我們的認識是不是太少了？其實古希臘的音樂也有些有樂譜。希臘人也嘗試重構古希臘的音樂，當然有幾成相似，難以知曉。正如中國常常喜歡炫耀編鐘，實則無人肯定編鐘的音樂是怎樣的。

有語言學家說，書寫系統僅乃符號，隨時可換了另一套符號，而語言的含意不變。這對於象形文字的中文或不適用，但對於拼音字母書寫的語言卻確實如此，有許多例子可證。如今天內蒙古仍沿用蒙古文，而外蒙古則用斯拉夫文字書寫。保加利亞丶羅馬尼亞相鄰，但前者用斯拉夫字母，後者卻用拉丁文書寫。古土耳其文以阿拉伯字母書寫，維吾爾文亦然。今天土耳其文卻以拉丁文書寫。越南棄漢字，代以法文的拼音。韓國自製拼音。希臘文的字母對我們來說，看來陌生，然若將字母變作拉丁文字母，不難發現和拉丁語系用詞仍多有相通也。例如從一到十的數字，十二個月份的名字，還有很多科學用詞來來自希臘語，例如藥房為φαρμακείο (Pharmakio)。 可惜我們平常所學的希臘字母，僅止於幾個代數符號，而且所用的英文讀音，又與現代希臘文不相同也。如 β 古爲 beta ，今作 vita。此 b, v/f 之變異，多見於各種語文，如 Budda 在福建話保持 Β 音，而廣東話、普通話則變成佛 fut / fo，西班牙文的 vine 卻讀成 bine，實在有趣。

另遇上 G，他是警察，最引以自豪的卻是懂得鑄刀。他說手工製的軍刀，厚薄輕重如意，刀托也可以選用不同物料。他說土耳其和希臘世仇，至今仍然互相敵視，難保不會戰爭。希臘人視土耳其人，有如我們視蒙古、滿清、日本一樣。何況現在 Cyprus 有一半被土耳其侵佔，土耳其亦欲得愛琴海之石油、礦產，兩國關係一直緊張。有趣的是，希臘人對中國人印象頗佳。要知道中國人自成一角，在英美等地，唐人街有如獨立小區，並不為當地人所喜也。雅典所見中國人，做餐館的反而少。多的反而是賣廉價衣服的。

想想旅行的意義，除了消費，休閑，獵奇，還有甚麼？但不懂當地文字，認識的都只能是很表面。跟隨旅行團，故然是走馬看花。即使是一人獨闖，雖然輕鬆自在，然則接觸的事物，亦只限於酒店、交通、飲食、購物，難以深入。更兼只有自己一個人記得，難以和人分享。有朋友帶路，好處是多瞭解一點點當地文化。有時參加些暑期課程，看看音樂節，乘機旅行，看的也更多，記憶也難忘。但要進一步深入，畢竟要長期居住和工作才能瞭解得到。但自己旅行的心態也日漸改變。從一開始很熱衷，趕景點、追看博物館，狂影相，到今天順步慢行，對拍照漸漸失去興趣。旅行，現在只是一個可以放下日常身份，把注意力投向身外事，而暫時忘卻自己事的輕鬆時候，無謂追趕。可能心態已不再年青，適合「老人與海」的慢節奏了。

I guess I can never master more than two languages in my life. Nonetheless, I’m interested in how people introduce their own languages these days and watched a lot of cheesy alphabet songs. It seems alphabet songs are common in some countries but not all.

The most common English alphabet song is Twinkle, twinkle little star. However, quite a number of songs are used in other European countries. The same set of Latin alphabets sound so different in European languages, not to mention words like “euro” that is pronounced quite differently across the EU countries.
Alfabeto Español
Italian alphabet song
Portugese (Brazilian) alphabet song
L’alphabet en Français

German uses the tune “Frère Jacques” for alphabet song. This song is so commonly known for a long time that even Mahler uses it in his first symphony:
Das deutsche Alphabet

I only got to know some of the Greek alphabets from maths or physics lessons, but I can’t yet spell all the alphabets – what a shame!

I wonder if any Greek and Cyprus children are learning their alphabet from this song though:
Greek Alphabet Rock

Russian alphabets in Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. Cyrillic script looks a bit similar to Greek script to me.
Песня алфавита (with Japanese subtitle)

Arabic is hard in a way that alphabets linked together in a word, and the same alphabet looks a bit different at the beginning, middle or the end. A lot of alphabets look so similar except the placement of the dot(s). Arabic pronunciation is quite hard in a way that it contains a lot of throat sounds that are uncommon in other languages.
Arabic alphabet song

Persian and Urdu alphabets are similar to Arabic due to Islamic influence.
Person alphabet song
Urdu alphabet song

Uighur, a Turkish tribe lives in Xinjiang of Northwest China, with a language is similar to Turkish, but they used a script similar to Arabic, while Turkish is written in a script similar to Latin languages.
Uighur alphabet song
Turkish alphabet song

There are so many languages in South Asia that I find it intriguing. Here are some of them:
Hindi alphabet song
Bengali alphabet song
Tamil alphabet song

Tibetan who lived in China-occupied Tibet has to learn both Tibetan and Mandarin Chinese. While most Tibetan who lived in India would learn Tibetan, Hindi and English. Tibetan script looks similar to Hindi, although Tibetan language and Chinese are often regarded as the same language family.

Tibetan Alphabet Song

Although Japanese and Korean both borrowed a lot of Chinese words in ancient time, but actually they are from a different language family that the grammar is totally different. Some linguistic experts think that Japanese, Korean, Mongolian, Manchurian, Turkish are from the same Altaic language family, sharing the same sentence structure and grammatical rules. A lot of nomadic tribes migrated from East Asia to Central Asia and Eastern Europe; probably that’s the reason why these languages are related.

Both Japanese and Korean invented their own alphabets at a later time, and thus their alphabets seems quite organized and logical. The 51 alphabets in Japanese are arranged in rows with different consonants, with each rows contains alphabets with the five different vowels a, i, u, e, o. Japanese pronunciation seems relatively simpler than a lot of languages and not too far from Latin too, which makes learning Japanese pronunciation much easier than Chinese for Europeans.

日本語 Japanese alphabet song (Youtube)

Korean alphabets are also well-organized and logical, in a way that a set of symbols are used for vowels and consonants are grouped into a few types of symbols. I can’t find any alphabet song yet, but here is a good explanation of its alphabets:
Korean Alphabets 한글 (Youtube)

Mongolian is complicated in a way that there are two different scripts. Cyrillic alphabets are used in Mongolia because of Russian influence, while the traditional alphabets are used in Inner Mongolian province in China. However, Mongolian people in China are required to learn Mandarin Chinese, and one would find Mongolian text alongside with Chinese in Inner Mongolian province. I can’t find an alphabet song with subtitles, but here are samples of Mongolian Cyrillic and traditional script. Traditional script are written from top to bottom.

Mongolian Cyrillic Alphabets
Mongolian traditional script

There is no such thing as “alphabet” in Chinese. That’s why Chinese is probably the hardest language to write. But the pronunciation of Mandarin Chinese is relatively simple if one has mastered the phonetics. All the “Chinese alphabet songs” on youtube are actually songs of phonetics, and they are not commonly known at all.

This is a Mandarin Pinyin (romanization) song:
Chinese (Mandarin) Alphabet Song

I can’t find any Cantonese phonetics song, but here is a very good introduction to the pronounciation:
Cantonese Initials
Cantonese finals
Cantonese tones

Chinese children usually start learning how to write characters with the numbers 一, 二, 三, 四. And they learn how to calculate multiples by a memorizing this table called 九因歌 (The Song of 9×9 Multiples):

The Song of Multiplications (in Cantonese)

That’s all so far. Sorry that there are still a lot of languages I haven’t covered here yet, e.g. Scandinavian and a lot of Eastern european languages. I’ll update it later. Thanks for reading!

p.s. a lot of people has asked me the difference between Cantonese and Mandarin. I guess I’d better write it as an FAQ so that I don’t need to answer this question again.

1. Cantonese is only used by around 10% or less of Chinese people who live in Guangdong province near the City of Gunagzhou, Hong Kong, Macau and part of Guangxi province. However, a lot of Cantonese people migrated overseas earlier than other parts of China. That’s why Cantonese is still often heard within overseas Chinese communities.
Mandarin is used by the majority in Mainland China and Taiwan, with minor differences in pronunciation though. In Taiwan, Min-nan (or Taiwanese Hokkien) is also an official language, alongside with Hakka and Formosan languages of aboriginal tribes.

2. Cantonese has nine tones. (Some scholars regarded it as six tones plus three tones with stopping consonants.) Mandarin only has four.

3. Cantonese’s pronunciation is much closer to classic Chinese in Tang and Song dynasty. “Entering tone” (words which stop with a consonant) is preserved in Cantonese and some other dialects, but not in Mandarin, which has been much affected by northern tribes such as Mongolian and Manchurian (that’s probably why it’s called Mandarin).

4. Cantonese and Mandarin are almost incomprehensible to each other. I would say the difference between Cantonese and Mandarin is much bigger than the difference between Portugese and Spanish.
5. We share the same written language, with minor discrepancies and usage of words. Mainland China uses simplified Chinese character which is a new invention by the communist party since the 1950s, while the traditional character is still used in Taiwan, Hong Kong & Macau.

This is a demonstration of the patch. Please listen with headphones to hear the binaural surround effect:

This MAX / MSP / Jitter patch uses webcam for motion tracking, and produce sound by means of cv.jit objects and ICST ambisonics panning.

cv.shift is used to compare two frames for the change in direction of an object and cv.jit.label to determine the size of the biggest enclosed area. The bigger the area, it triggers MIDI notes with a higher velocity. Then I used the MIDI data to load samples of metallic percussions in Kontakt.

More detailed description and patch available soon.

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Score / Guidelines (PDF)

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ii. Village Song
(Score will be available soon)

iii. Impermanance
(Score will be available soon)

Ivit, Ivit

adapted from Sutra Cordis Magnae Sapientiae Transcendentis (Heart sutra, a buddhist text) and Latin liturgy In Paradisum

Latin
Ivit, ivit, transivit, totum transivit, Illuminatio tum sit. (the original text is a Sanskrit mantra, Gaté Gaté Paragaté Parasamgaté Bodhi Svaha, translated in Latin).
In paradisum deducant te Angeli

English translation
Gone, gone, gone beyond, altogether beyond, then it is the other shore, the truth, the awakening, fulfilled.
May angels lead you into paradise.

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據書中所云，小孩三歲就懂說謊，長大了不是不說謊，而是知道甚麼情況應當說真話，甚麼情況應該有所隱瞞。例如你覺得某人的衣服很醜，一般大人通常會不說出口，而自閉症的人通常無法想像對方有感受，會說真話。最有趣的是其中一個研究個案，對西非某城巿的兩間學校的研究，一間學校校規寛鬆，如果學生犯了錯平常也只是老師責罵，另一間學校犯一些小過足以退學，嚴厲得有如中世紀的修道院。於是找兩間學校的學生做實驗，實驗是老師和學生一對一，叫學生猜謎，答案就放在老師桌上，然後老師問到某一題目時假裝有緊要電話暫離課室，而且一去就是十多分鐘。結果發現大多數學生還是忍不住偷看答案的。只是校規較鬆的那一間學生被問到他為何會知道答案（那答案其實是錯的，不偷看的話不可能會這樣答），通常問多一會，那學生就會坦白自己偷看了。而校規較嚴的那一間，學生通常等得較久才敢去偷看，而當被問到他為甚麼會知道答案，他會作出很多理由，去解釋自己是怎樣猜到的，也就是，他們更懂得說謊，而且說謊說得更好。他們知道要麼不要犯錯，若果犯了錯就絕不能承認，承認了會有很嚴重的後果。

引申到政治，統治者說謊隱瞞政府過錯，這是無論民主國家還是極權國家皆然。但是在極權國家，通常人民心裏知道政府在說謊，卻不一定敢去揭穿，而人民也習慣了對政府隱瞞和說謊，甚至知道對著朋友親戚都要盡量少談政治，以保護自己。一個極權國家就是一個大家都要說謊的環境。（又或者大家都說謊，所以造就了極權國家？）

另外，書中有趣的是關於測謊，從古到今人們怎樣用盡方法想測破謊言，但始終人不是別人心裏的蛔蟲，永遠無法得知別人心裏所想和臉上表達的是否如一，但人人都會以貌取人。見工面試，做老闆的總以為在兩三分鐘的過程裏已經能洞識求職者是怎樣的一個人，而見工者總是覺得自己兩三分鐘內對方怎可能瞭解自己。又例如最近哄動英美和意大利的（Amanda Knox案件 ），很多人看了新聞報導上的圖片，都直覺地認為女被告的外表清純，實則奸險，還不用法庭去審判，已經心中認定這個人是有罪的。評論這段新聞的人就是這本書的作者，他就提到我們經常過份信賴自己洞察他人的能力，同時間卻又經常會覺得別人容易誤解自己的表情和行為 (imbalance of knowledge)。例如我們看見別人黑面，就認為對方討厭自己。又或者看見對方累得沒有反應，卻理解為對方不開心。基本上我們沒有能力感受別人所感受的，只能夠猜測別人的想法。書中也提到很多的戲劇，其衝突或者笑點都是這些誤解開始的。

而書中也提及人類說謊的能力其實也正正是創作故事的能力，我們都沒見過有翼的天使，但見過人，見過鳥的翅膀，於是腦海裏把兩個物件的概念加在一起，就能夠想像出有翼的天使。當小孩為了告訴母親為何自己擦了牙之後還要吃朱古力，他就開始創作故事了。這書不是教大家怎樣去說謊，只是指出了說謊這種本能不是非黑即白的。看罷只能嘆一句，世事都給他看透了。

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