Different Path, Same Dream

(Source- Different Dream, episode 22, viki.com) The variation on the famous aphorism purportedly represents the meeting of minds between Kim Ku and Kim Won-bong. The original four character Chinese idiom is 동상이몽 (同床異夢) (same bed different dreams). It has been changed to say, "different paths, same dream."


From my prior post on the drama and it's relation to current events, June 18, 2019:

...the drama series Different Dream was produced in South Korea to celebrate the centennial of the March First Movement (the Korean independence movement).

"Uiyeoldan (Heroic Corps) was the most threatening organization to Japan in Korea's independence movement history. Along with its leader Kim Won-bong, many other activists' lives have been reflected in the story." *

*Drama portrays life of freedom fighter ( 이 몽 Different Dream 異夢)
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/art/2019/04/688_266957.html

Interestingly, an MBC promotion of the spy action drama about the underground anti-Japanese Heroic Group explains there is a hidden meaning in the title: <이몽> 제목 속에 숨겨진 의미! From two different paths one dream. '이도일몽(異道一夢) , 두 개의 길, 하나의 꿈' The actor Yoo Ji Tae plays Kim Won-bong, the leader of Uiyeoldan (Heroic Corps).*

*출처: https://blog.mbc.co.kr/3015 [MBC 공식 블로그]

In the drama, episodes 22, near the end, and the beginning of episode 23, Kim Ku is said to have come to Keongseong, Korea, in late 1931, for the purpose of laying the propaganda backdrop for an attempted assassination by Lee Bong-chang on Japanese Emperor Hirohito in Tokyo in January 1932. A meeting of the leader of the Patriotic Corps, Kim Ku, with the leader of the Heroic Corps, Kim Won-bong is dramatized, with the delivery of the 異道一夢 four character calligraphy.

The original idiom is not uncommon in Korean vernacular and well understood. So the "hidden meaning" of the title alluded to in the press promotion and drama, is changed to a more positive meaning in an attempt to quell controversy or conflict by a shift in perspective to focus on a shared national goal.

As intended in the historical drama, the adaptation of the old expression 동상이몽 (同床異夢) was meant to mediate the ideological rift within the Korean independence movement, then, and hence, the current North- South division. Yet, the original idiom still applies to North and South Korean relations. In fact, the two competing expressions represent competing historical threads, one of which is generally unrecognized in Japan and the US for obvious reasons.

The original idiom has also been applied recently to the sputtering top down negotiations between Kim Jong Un and Trump.