ICN-NRT OZ 744
In ICN we had a brief stint in the Asiana business lounge in the main terminal. I have three memories of the lounge:
1. Plane spotting was plentiful
2. They had scrambled eggs with broccoli that simply blew my mind
3. Using the happy face button on the washlet does exactly as advertised, I have never laughed so hard in my life. Going down the buttons as I had no clue what they do I came across the button with the happy face, of course the child I am I had to push it, and let’s just say the outcome was hilarious. The conversation that ensued with my wife about it also provided me with entertainment, her, not so much. Apologies for the TMI, but we cover it all here in trip reports.
We had heard that shopping in ICN was plentiful and since I’ve kept the misses cooped up in the safety of airline lounges she hasn’t had a chance to spend money. We swung by the duty free shop because I hadn’t seen a bottle of scotch since Frankfurt and this turned out to be a mistake. The duty free store was similar to the local mall during the holiday rush, I couldn’t navigate around, after wondering about how much damage I could do on my credit card I decided my money would be best spent on dinners in Tokyo and walked out.
We navigated over to the gate for NRT to see the big 744 that would be taking the short sub 2 hour flight over to Tokyo this morning. Living in the US and seeing a 744 for a less than 2 hour flight is a bit comical. Considering a few days prior I flew hub to hub on a CRJ or some such thing where when I walked on I needed to duck. So my excitement to both ride upstairs and on a superjumbo was similar to pushing the happy face button on the washlet.
Asiana 744:
I’ve been upstairs before on a 747, but never actually had a seat. Once seated we were offered water or OJ, I do not recall if champagne was offered or if it was apple juice or was it soju, it doesn’t matter I guess. The load was light, I believe half full, or half empty depending on your personal view. Menus were handed out and orders were taken before leaving the ground. I opted for the Korean option of porrage with duck and traditional garnishes. My wife decided for the ‘western’ option, the flight attendant smiled as I placed my order because she knew I went with the right decision.
We shortly took off and started heading out of ICN in the scariest directions to the North, but quickly changed direction. I fired up the tablet for more meth making and shortly thereafter lunch was served.
Lunch:
My wife was unhappy with her choice and I was thoroughly enjoying mine. Lunch was cleaned up and I’ll preface what happened next by saying if you were the person I’m referring to please explain yourself as I’d like to know. Back to the report, so at this point I was a little into my second episode of my show when my wife pointed out that the gentleman to my right had been brushing his teeth for the last 30 minutes, so I happened to peak over to witness it and sure enough there he was going hard at it. Now I’m all for dental hygiene but I brush my teeth for two minutes in the morning and at night before bed, how you brush your teeth for going on now 45 minutes mid-flight and with I assume is no toothpaste is just mindboggling. I just kept telling myself that I was about to land in Tokyo and chalked it up to culture.
At this point we were nearing the East coast of Japan and we were shortly on the ground after that. We had landed on one side of NRT, and then taxied to the other side, I believe it took longer than the flight to taxi to the gate, but I’m probably exaggerating about that. On the way over to the gate it provided me with some spotting options, however I only took one photo.
SQ A380:
Overall the flight was quick and painless, I appreciated the 744 on the two hour flight, I also should note that I had the option to choose F on the united flight later on in the day, but I picked the business option on OZ due to the time. We were shortly through immigration and on our way to the Park Hyatt Tokyo for 5 days in the city.