蟾宫折桂

chán gōng zhé guì

lit. plucking a branch of osmanthus from the Toad Palace (i.e. the moon)

fig. to succeed in the imperial examination

蟾

chán

toad ("chán" represents the sound of its croaking)

宫

gōng

palace

折

zhé

variant of 折[zhe2]

桂

guì

abbr. for Guangxi Autonomous Region 廣西壯族自治區|广西壮族自治区[Guang3 xi1 Zhuang4 zu2 Zi4 zhi4 qu1]