That never occurred to me as it feels like a proper intl. flight with duty free, immigration, customs.

So I really learn something new and beyond what HNL call centre has told me. As last year on YVR-SFO-FRA, I had a tight connection on SFO (thanks to changes in schedule) and a great upper deck exit row on SFO-FRA. So I wanted to standby for an earlier YVR-SFO and HNL told me that as all my segments are intl, there is no way I could do so .