The next morning had an early wake-up call due to a morning flight out of Narita and our AirBnb being on the wrong side of Tokyo from the airport. After taking the JR train and Keisei Skyline to NRT we settled into another 7-11 breakfast from the landside location in terminal 2.
After having breakfast and clearing security we headed to the depths of T2 to the bus gate hall. Interestingly, in addition to finding few trash cans at the airport, there seemed to be virtually no water fountains in the airport. We didn't have much time to wait before boarding was called for our flight and we boarded the buses to our plane.
ZE606
NRT-ICN
Boeing 737-800
17B
Our flight to Seoul was aboard Eastar Jet, an LCC based in Seoul. Our particular plane is one of the older varieties of the 737-800 with the rectangular windows and was
previously involved in the buffalo accident when it previously flew for SpiceJet. Unfortunately being an LCC I was at the mercy of the seat assignment gods and ended up in a middle seat for the first time since the first time I flew an LCC in 2013. The primary color scheme for Eastar Jet aboard their planes is red four-point hypocycloids (aka the red/blue/yellow shape on the Pittsburgh Steelers' helmets) on a gray background. Once again there were signs on the exit row seats saying that the seats were for sale for anyone who wanted the legroom, though both exit rows went out empty on this flight.
Cabin
Pitch
Announcements were made in Korean, Japanese and English. Soon after we were on our way in the air on our way to Seoul. On this flight there was no cart going through the aisle, with the FAs instead holding up the BOB menu and duty free booklet taking orders while walking down the aisle. To be completely honest I basically passed out for most of the flight so not much to report. Once we arrived at ICN we grabbed our bags and headed out to Seoul.
The robots taking over at ICN
We took the all-stop subway to our AirBnB near Hongik university and were promptly greeted with this sign at the elevator of our building.
The building itself was an apartment building with some commercial in the basement area adjacent to the subway station, but the design of the building and hallways made it seem like it was the type of apartment that belonged to a company and housed company employees. What didn't help improve the legality/sketchiness factor was that the building keycard was retrieved from a sketchy unmarked unlocked white van in the parking garage whose windows were covered in black trash bags. The units were unlocked using a keypad and are generally pretty spartan.
Living area
Kitchenette
After dropping our stuff off we headed into the Hongik/Hongdae area to explore our lunch options and settled on Piggy Bank, a popular Korean BBQ place that cooks meat on jade stone. It's not an all you can eat place, but the meat on offer is very good.
Late lunchers
Salted pork + beef shortrib
After a lovely lunch we wandered around some more and we ducked into a candy shop for a small dessert.
Since this day was only a partial day in Seoul, we ended up going cosmetics shopping for most of the remainder of the day for my friend (zzz...). Our first stop was Lotte Mart where my friend bought buckets of cosmetics and I bought another snack.
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Snack
Our final stop of the day was Myeongdong, the shopping district. However the shopping begins before you even reach the street as there is an underground market attached to the subway station.
Myeongdong itself can be described in two words: bright and repetitive. There were so many lights and lighted signs everywhere, and everything from the stores themselves to the food vendors seemed to repeat themselves regularly. With all of this repetition it felt a little artificial and forced. While my friend did even more shopping I primarily did even more eating because that's what I do.