Ep C: Chénggōng Koxinga 鄭成功
(想聽2021年1月29日的廣播節目可以點開上面音符圖案的檔案 If you'd like to listen to the original 1/29/2021 radio episode, please click on the above music note to play the file)
If you spend much time traveling around Taiwan, you'll notice there are a lot of schools, streets and even a town named Chénggōng (成功). The translation of that word into English is success, but the popularity of the name doesn't come from people wanting to succeed more. It comes from one of the names of this week's topic: Koxinga, the merchant pirate who took Taiwan from the Dutch in the 1600s. In Taiwan, he's most often referred to in Mandarin by the name 鄭成功 (Zhèng Chénggōng), so all of those place names come from his given name, Chénggōng, which also happens to mean success in English. But while he's pretty famous in Eastern Asia, most Taiwanese people I've spoken to have no idea that his English name is Koxinga! Koxinga sounds like it may be Japanese (his mom was Japanese), but it's actually one of his other names, 國姓爺, pronounced in Taiwanese, Kok-sìng-iâ, and then written down by the Dutch using their pronunciation: Koxinga. Whew! With all those names and pronunciations, I think he succeeded in getting us all confused! But all you need to know is that whatever you want to call him, Koxinga made a big change in history of Taiwan. And, well, his English name sounds pretty cool too. (Remember to look at the bottom of the post for the song chords!)
如果你花一些時間在台灣各地旅行的話，你會發現有很多學校、街道或甚至連城鎮都以成功這個詞來命名。成功直接翻譯成英語是success，但是這個名稱的普及並不是來自台灣人特別希望獲得更多成功。其實它來自本週主題的名稱之一：Koxinga，那位商人海盜，在1600年代從荷蘭人手中奪走了台灣 。在台灣，一般人用國語叫他鄭成功（ZhèngChénggōng），也就是因為這樣這些學校地名都用成功(Chénggōng )作為他們的取名，只是剛好也意味著英語上的success。不過，雖然他在東亞很有名，但我跟台灣人聊起他的時候大多數人都不知道他的英文名字叫做Koxinga！ Koxinga聽起來可能是日語（他的母親確實是日本人），但實際上Koxinga是他另外的名字其中之一，那就是國姓爺。 如果用台語講國姓爺，他就是Kok-sìng-iâ發音，後來荷蘭人聽到這個台語名字並用他們荷蘭人口音的寫法把名字寫成：Koxinga。 喲！既然有那麼多名稱和發音，我認為他「成功」地讓我們所有人感到困惑！哎呀不管了，反正你所需要知道的就是，無論你想稱呼他什麼，Koxinga改變了台灣的歷史。而且，他的英文名字聽起來很炫。（記得看網頁最下面的地方就可以找到歌曲的和絃囉！）
Koxinga
國姓爺/鄭成功
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
Four hundred years ago 四百年前
In a city called Anping (that's Tainan!) 在座城市叫安平(那就是台南!)
The Dutch built a
place called 荷蘭人建了一個地方叫做
Fort Zeelandia 熱蘭遮城/安平古堡
Many years after that 一些年後
A famous pirate man
一位有名的海盜男生
Went to Anping with a plan 帶著計劃去安平
To take Zeelandia 就是要搶走熱蘭遮城/安平古堡
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
He took Taiwan 他搶走台灣
With his big army of 用他大大的軍隊
Pirates and soldiers 包含海盜及士兵
And sent those Dutch 然後讓那些荷蘭人
On the run 跑掉
Koxinga was a pirate 國姓爺/鄭成功是海盜
And a merchant's son 也是商人的兒子
He had a Chinese father 他有中國人的爸爸
And a Japanese mom 還有日本人的媽媽
In Tainan and Taiwan 在台南和台灣
He goes by many names 他有很多名字
In Mandarin he's called success 用國語他被叫成成功
But in Taiwanese they say 但用台語講大家說
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
He took Taiwan 他搶走台灣
With his big army of 用他大大的軍隊
Pirates and soldiers 包含海盜及士兵
And sent those Dutch 然後讓那些荷蘭人
On the run 跑掉
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
Koxinga 國姓爺/鄭成功
A legend, a leader 傳奇人物、領袖
A general, a son 將軍、兒子
Love him or hate him 愛他或恨他
He sent those Dutch 他把那些荷蘭人送
Out of Taiwan 出去台灣
