I didn’t expect to visit Korea again till Melody’s at the age whereby she can get double eyelid surgery. BUT we won a sponsored trip to Korea so woohoo! 
We booked a red-eye flight so Melody would (hopefully) KO during the 6-hour journey and we would not have to repeat the traumatic experience during the flight to Taiwan, when she wailed and thrashed about and caused such a ruckus likely because her ears were hurting as the plane was about to land. The only awesome thing about flying with a baby/infant/toddler is that you get priority when boarding planes and also get priority immigration clearance at Incheon airport. And while we were in Seoul, we read the news about the giant sinkhole which caused a motorcyclist to lose his life, and the massive wildfires causing so much destruction, but we did not experience any disruptions to our itinerary. Turns out it also started snowing after we’d left Seoul. And now there are (daily) protests going on. Hmm.
I’d booked our seats – 10A, B, and C – so we had the most legroom, being at the head of the Economy class section of the plane. Interestingly, on both Asiana Airlines’ flights we took, there were people who knowingly sat in the seats near us even though they’d not paid extra for them and were told by cabin crew to please return to their allocated seats. I guess it’s a case of ‘if you don’t try then you won’t know’. XD I’d never dare to pull off such a shameless stunt. ‘Cos how embarrassing is it to have a stewardess ask you to return to your seat, please.
Being a kid also has its perks: you get craft sets to keep you occupied (for all of 5 minutes) during the flight.
We’d brought the iPad, of course. Though we made the rookie mistake of not downloading MORE videos. We’d thought Melody would watch ‘Little Angel’ as usual but she suddenly requested for Cocomelon. OMG.
Interestingly, the flight to Korea had arguably better food than the return trip! I got bibimbap, of course. And it came with fruit. Yum.
At Incheon Airport, we bought bus tickets for the Airport Limousine bus service. You can use the self-serve kiosks if you have Tmoney or head to the counter and pay with cash (which was what we did). It’s 17,000 won per adult, and FOC for Melody ‘cos she sat on our laps.
If you’re not traveling light, it makes sense to board one of the limousine buses so you won’t have to navigate the train stations with their many flights of stairs and barely any escalators or lifts. The hotel I’d booked – The Splaisir Myeongdong – was right by one of the bus stops. Bus 6001 stops at the side of the road that the hotel is on (bus stop name: Namdaemun Market) However, I didn’t know that at first so we got tickets for bus 6015 instead. And it stopped across the road from our hotel so we had to drag our luggage over. Bummer. *If you’re trying to decide which hotel in Seoul to book, maybe take a look at the bus stops and see where the buses will take you directly to.
The digital signage at the bus bay tells you when the next bus will arrive so you can choose to stand outside in the cold or pop back into the airport where it’s wayyy warmer. There’ll be a bus arriving every 15 minutes or so. We also got water from the convenience store at the airport because the journey would take about an hour… and thankfully we did so because it took almost 2 hours that day since it was the morning peak hour for traffic plus there had been an accident. SO yah… do schedule up to 2 hours for getting from the airport to downtown Seoul via airport limousine bus too, in case you suay suay get stuck in a massive jam.
I may be biased but… she always looks so pretty when asleep. Good genes. XDAnyway, hotel check-in time is 3pm, which imho is ridiculously late, so we put our luggage into one of the free lockers at the hotel lobby (enter through the main doors and turn left). *If those lockers are full, you can find more lockers near the gents’.
This is the sight which greeted us when we entered the hotel lobby:
After we’d deposited our luggage, I used Naver Map (since Google Maps is said to be unreliable in Seoul) to get us to Myeongdong Kyoja, which has gotten accolades from the Michelin food guide for Seoul for many years. Even though it opens only at 1030am, by 1015am or so, there were already a dozen people in line and the queue just got longer and longer. Definitely order a basket of their steamed dumplings, and their famous dumpling noodle soup. And help yourself to their super garlicky and oh-so-shiok kimchi. I like how delicate the noodle strands are, and how incredibly thin the dumpling skins are… but Michelin? Hmm. Maybe it was the kimchi which won them extra points. And there’s a lift in there but groups of 3 or more are asked to climb the stairs up to the 3rd floor. Consider it your morning workout.
And not too far away is the LINE Friends store. You get 10% discount with your WOWPASS, which we hadn’t gotten at this point. Our hotel actually has a WOWPASS machine at the lobby (bring your passport along and get your WOWPASS on the spot). It’s super easy to deposit cash into your card but… withdrawing it is another story altogether (must download app and all, so we haven’t done it).
And I totally did not expect that the gashapon machines in the LINE Friends store would only accept card payment. Don’t these things usually accept coins or tokens?! Anyway… I missed the chance to buy these awesome Cardcaptor Sakura x SANRIO figurines. When we next returned to the store with a WOWPASS, they were already gone and replaced by other items. SIGHHHHHHHH.
Oh… and you can erm, caress, these handprints of BTS members…
And since there’s no Hello Kitty cafe at the airport anymore, we went to the Hello Kitty Apple Cafe in Myeongdong. There was a short queue outside, so I told the staff that I’d just like to visit the gift shop at the third floor, and they let me in immediately.
When I was done shopping (actually only bought 1 item), I got back down to level 1 where I saw a few unoccupied tables. Asked the staff if I could take one and so we did… I bought drinks (iced americano for him and a diabetes-inducing peach tea for myself WLE 200% sugar in there I think), and an apple-mango cake to share – it was as tasty as it looked. And I thought Kitty cafe food was bad.
And of course we went into the POPMART store. Mainly to ogle the oversized Molly figurines. Here’s one in a kawaii Melody design:
And we also went to the famous 12-storey Daiso store. Each level is actually pretty compact so it’s not as crazy big as you’d expect it to be. It’s recommended to take one of the lifts up to the 12th floor, and slowly make your way down (via stairs) and check out each level. *Toilets are on the 11th floor so make sure you pee then.
Prices start from 1000 won which is less than 1 Singapore dollar. Cheap cheap cheap. And there are some items like this carrying case / mini luggage that really look like they are priced too cheaply… under S$5 for this?!
So this is the end of Part One. Watch out for Part Two. XD