This article is reprinted from the WeChat public account of a WeChat group reader, "Lazy 33’s Eating, Drinking, and Fun." Original link.

Booking the flight

For the Korea-to-China leg, we chose OZ331, Asiana Airlines flight from Seoul Incheon to Beijing Capital. We bought economy class tickets, and the price was very cheap. You can upgrade online 72 hours before departure, but children can’t do it online and have to contact customer service. I was feeling lazy again, and since the flight was short anyway, I gave up on the idea.

Korean Air belongs to SkyTeam, while Asiana is in Star Alliance, but the two airlines have a close partnership. Korean Air even nearly acquired Asiana before the deal apparently fell through because of antitrust issues (?). The staff at Vancouver airport told us that baggage could be checked through between Korean Air and Asiana and asked whether we wanted that. Given how many things can go wrong with through-checking baggage between different airlines, and since we also needed overnight bags, we chose not to check through.

Check-in & security

There wasn’t much to write about check-in, except that when I booked my child’s ticket, I used the child’s travel document. Asiana’s ground staff said they didn’t recognize the travel document and it took quite a while to sort out. On top of that, other airlines usually handle baggage drop right at check-in, but Asiana’s staff sent us to the self-bag-drop counter after check-in. The system was very slow: every bag required going through the full process again, which caused another delay.

We also had to fill out the customs fingertip code, and it just had to be completed within 24 hours in advance. We filled it out on the shuttle from Incheon Airport to the transit hotel. It took a few minutes per person. We also did the nucleic acid test ourselves and took photos, but no one actually looked at them.

After dropping off our bags, we headed straight to the gate. It was still before 6 a.m., and even the shortest ID check line was a 30-minute wait, comparable to Seattle. We’ve been spoiled by TSA Pre + Clear, so we never queue this long.

After finally getting through with the child, my passport scan showed an issue with checked baggage and said I needed to confirm it at the baggage inspection room next to the Asiana counter.

Most importantly, we had to queue for the ID check again!! By then, the shortest line was already 45 minutes long, so we immediately decided that my partner would rejoin the line with the child, while I went to the baggage inspection room to verify the luggage.

There was another line at the door to the inspection room. Once I got into the “little black room,” they told me that the Lysol disinfectant spray we’ve taken to various countries before could not be checked in Korea. I said I understood, and kindly reminded the staff that there were 3 bottles of disinfectant spray in my suitcase. However, the staff insisted there were only two, and said the machine had only scanned two as well, which made me think my partner had used one up in Korea. The funniest part is that later, at Beijing’s high-speed rail station, security found another bottle. The scanner’s accuracy is pretty questionable.

Thankfully I had let my partner and the child go rejoin the line first. By the time I finished with the luggage check and came out, the line had gotten even longer again. My partner and the child were almost at the front, so we hurried through security. My friend said that when she travels with her child at Korean airports, they can use fast-track security, but we never encountered that, and there wasn’t any fast lane at all. Security also pulled our carry-on suitcase aside, but in the end they didn’t open it or do any extra inspection; after waiting a bit, we were through. It felt inexplicable.

T1 terminal

After all that chaos, we finally got into the terminal at 6:45. Originally, we had planned to come in a little after 6 to shop duty-free, then eat at the lounge once it opened at 7. At that point, there wasn’t much time left for duty-free shopping. We quickly went to Gentle Monster and picked up two pairs of sunglasses. T1 basically has all the major brands, and the duty-free shops have very long opening hours, much friendlier than Haneda Airport.

The transit hotel under renovation.

We used Priority Pass to spend some time in Asiana’s lounge. The food selection was quite abundant, with both Asian dishes and Western food. The child oddly liked their sandwiches a lot.

OZ331

The flight time was only about 2 hours, so after one meal we were basically there. Probably because this was a flight departing from Korea’s home base, the economy-class meal on Asiana was even tastier than the business-class meal we had on Korean Air’s transpacific flight before.

Arrival!

We finally made it back to China! The moment we landed, I almost teared up. For us, who used to return to China at least once almost every year, four years was really far too long.

Immigration went very smoothly. We only showed customs the child’s travel document, and that was enough. Four years ago when we came back, customs kept asking us to show the child’s U.S. passport..

Beijing Capital Airport T3 is still enormous, and it felt like the light rail ride went on forever.

After picking up our luggage and clearing customs, the declaration staff looked like a master-and-apprentice pair. When they saw us coming, the master pointed us out to the apprentice, which made me nervous for a moment, worried that the gifts we brought for friends and family might get taxed. Sure enough, the apprentice stopped us, but only looked at the luggage cart and then let us go. I let out a long sigh..

Because we had a lot of luggage, we didn’t take a taxi for pickup. Instead, we booked a 7-seat business van on Ctrip. We didn’t book very far in advance; we booked it that morning and only needed to enter the flight number. The pickup vehicle was parked in the parking lot, and we had to ask airport staff to find the place, but after that everything went smoothly.

The plane landed at about 9:40, and we reached the parking lot around 10:30. Ctrip also estimates pickup time based on whether you have checked baggage and whether the flight is domestic or international.

The trip to Beijing Chaoyang Railway Station also went smoothly, and we arrived around 11.

We took a lot of high-speed rail on this trip back. Since my ID card had expired and the child still hadn’t been registered in the hukou, we also tried all sorts of ways to buy high-speed rail tickets. In the next post, I’ll talk about our experience taking high-speed rail in this situation.

2023 Homecoming Series

About the author

This article is reprinted from the WeChat public account of a WeChat group reader, "Lazy 33’s Eating, Drinking, and Fun." These are all original good articles, so if you’re interested, please follow along.