As part of my award ticket, I would need to reposition myself to Chicago to get the first of three flights to Melbourne.  My USAir flight from Philadelphia to Chicago, where I would stay overnight, was quite interesting.  I had heard commotion from the rows behind me during the flight – apparently a man locked himself in the bathroom and then passengers got him out only for him to ask for oxygen and it ended as we were met by paramedics when we landed for him to be carried out – definitely a new one for me!

When researching the award ticket, there was good availability  on Asiana Airlines Business Class to Seoul from Chicago.  Having never flown with Asiana, I was excited to try the business class as they have a new flat bed product called Smartium.  This new product doesn’t fly from Chicago as I would realize (it does fly from NYC, LAX, SFO and LHR).  Given my maddening scribbles of putting the award ticket together, I overlooked this important fact and ended up with the older angled business class seat for my fourteen hour flight.

KLM Lounge at O’Hare for Asiana Business Class passengers

Asiana uses the KLM business class lounge at O’Hare.  The lounge is quite small but designed well with lots of color and a plethora of outlets at each seat.  The food on offer wasn’t exciting (cold cuts and snacks) but the fantastic lounge staff helped me create two small sandwiches by finding turkey in the kitchen as well as foil to wrap my food. As the international gates were under construction and only a few restaurants had been opened, I didn’t have as many options to bring food on the plane with me as I usually do.

Asiana Boarding at Chicago O’Hare

Waiting at the gate, the flight was delayed twice and with each delay the staff profusely apologized. The delay ended up being about 1/2 hour so rather than depart at noon, we quickly boarded about 12:30 pm.  My flight was configured with first/business/coach sections.  The Asiana business class section was arranged as 2-3-2 across each row on this 777-200ER V4 plane. Business class consists of 28 seats in two rows before and after the galley.  I was in the second section of seats behind the galley in a window seat on the bulkhead row.

When I arrived at my seat, the silver amenity kit was at my seat and like a kid at Christmas, I was excited to see what was inside.  Asiana uses L’Occitane (I was a bit disappointed as I buy this brand at home so it wasn’t special to me).  The kit contained hand cream, cleaning cloth and shea butter in addition to the standards – comb, eyemask, toothbrush/paste and earplugs.  We were given slippers to wear rather than a pair of socks – I love slippers!

It a Long Flight to Seoul – Almost Fourteen Hours!

What to do for almost fourteen hours (13 hrs 50 mins)?  Well, lucky for me we left in the daytime so I was awake and chock full of magazines.   The cabin crew of young, pretty girls with flawless skin (ok, so only other women will notice and appreciate this) offered papers and magazines as well as a pre-departure drink.  While I didn’t count the number of staff working our business class cabin, it seemed like a hundred!  Yes, I exaggerate but there was a crew member for each aspect of service – one for papers, another for the coffee cart, another for food, one with the wine (very important!) and yet another with hot towels.  Having had to go in search of water and service on other foreign carriers, this over attentiveness was welcome.

My seatmate was a women from Canada who redeemed her points to go to Vietnam with her friend (seated in coach), she was very friendly and we had good conversations during the flight.  The woman across the aisle was on a volunteer mission – she was so fascinating with a full time job, five older children and using her downtime to volunteer in Asia for short stretches of time.  I was going on vacation and she was quite literally saving the world, you have to admire people like that.  It was worth putting the headphones down to meet these women – the very long flight went by quickly and my life was made richer with the stories of their lives.

I had ordered a special meal (no lactose) and it’s always a gamble – ideally, I’d really love just plain chicken and vegetables, but I usually get a fish dish.  As I don’t eat fish, I always feel bad and need to figure out what’s left to choose from in the regular menu.  The flight attendant was very accomodating to my food issue after first bringing my “special meal” of fish.  We compromised on the lovely beef dish with many glasses of red. The standard menu is six courses –  appetizer, starter, soup, entree, cheese service and dessert.  I chose 1-2 courses each time. You won’t starve on the flight – the portion size is large and the food quite good.

After the food service and several magazines, I turned toward the in-flight entertainment (IFE).  My IFE was in the bulkhead wall – easy to view, albeit a bit dark as you can’t move the screen to optimize the lighting.  With a plethora of movie options, I watched two movies and then another round of food. Surprisingly, the blankets are quite thin (ah, how i miss the duvets of LAN) so I had to request a second blanket.

Despite the angled business class seat, I found a way to be comfortable with my window view and easy access to the aisle (no ninja yoga moves required to climb over my seatmate) to visit the bathroom.  The bathrooms require a special note as Asiana cabin crew clean them after each use which is something I’ve never seen in all of my years of flying.

Arriving in Seoul (ICN Airport)

As we set up our approach to Seoul (ICN) airport, I looked out the window and saw the water and many islands below.  In between the water and the islands, I was surprised by the wind farm.  It was very cool to see as I’m fascinated by the wind farms in the middle of here, there and nowhere.

With an smooth landing, I bid adieu to the ladies on the row – I was on Central Time so it was near 2 am and time for bed for me, they still had more flights to go. Transitioning the airport, it was a long, long walk to immigration where I was fingerprinted (ick, they don’t clean after each person) and photographed.  Retrieving my luggage was easy at the end of the terminal which made my way to the curb to wait for me Hyatt Incheon shuttle pretty quick at 13B.

Flight 1 of 3 was complete, next up would be Seoul to Singapore in the morning with my first Singapore Airlines flight.