took the plum tree for his wife and a stork for his son(qī mén zǐ hè)

took the plum tree for his wife and a stork for his son

Wife, plum, son and crane, Chinese idiom, Pinyin is Q ī m é iz ǐ h è, which means to take plum as wife and crane as son, which means to live in seclusion. From Ci yuan congtan.

The origin of Idioms

Volume 3 of CI yuan congtan written by Xu Peng in the Qing Dynasty: "Lin Chushi's wife, plum, son and crane can be called the high wind of the ages."

Idiom usage

It refers to the life of a hermit.

Chinese PinYin : qī mén zǐ hè