刻鵠類鶩 kè hú lèi wù

DEFINITIONS

  1. to aim to carve a swan and get a semblance of a duck (idiom)
  2. to fail utterly in trying to copy something
  3. to get a reasonably good, if not perfect, result

CHARACTERS

刻 kè
HSK 3
carve, engrave; quarter hour
鵠 hú target
類 lèi class, group, kind, category
鶩 wù duck