The Guizhou Donkey Used up His Tricks

Characters:

Pronunciation: qian(2) lu(2) ji(4) qiong(2)
Explanation: A metaphor to say that someone is at his/her wit's end

Tone: Negative

The Story: In Ancient China, there was no donkey in Guizhou. A curious man bought one and shipped it to Guizhou, but he did not know how to deal with it, so he put it in the mountains and let it be. And so the donkey just stayed there...

One day, a tiger came and saw the donkey. He saw it was such a big creature and thought it must be a monster. He was so afraid that he dared not show himself to the donkey. After several days, when the tiger was peeking, the donkey shouted loud! The tiger thought the donkey would come to kill him, so he ran away with fear. Later the tiger found that the donkey did not chase him, and so he came back and walked closer. He saw that there was nothing to be afraid of, and in fact the donkey was crying!

Little by little, the tiger walked nearer to the donkey, and found that it was not fearful at all. He walked by the donkey's side, jostled it even by putting his front paw on the donkey's leg. The donkey was irritated and kicked the tiger. The tiger thought to himself, "That is all he can do? This animal can only lightly kick me?!?!" So he rushed at the donkey, pushed it over, and severed its throat and ate it. The donkey tasted delicious!

Usage Example (Pinyin): Xiao(3) qiang(2) qian(2) lu(2) ji(4) qiong(2), cheng(2) ren(4) pian(4) le bie(2) ren(2).

Usage Example (English translation): Like the Guizhou donkey that used up his tricks, Xiao Qiang at last admitted he cheated others.

Note: The spoken Chinese Mandarin language has 4 spoken tones. We have attempted to re-create those above where after each syllable we tell you (1), (2), (3), or (4) as they correspond to each of the 4 tones. We encourage you to complement your Xianzai.com Chinese Idioms newsletter with a good offline study program.