Hi guys,

A couple of days ago, I had this fantastic opportunity of flying in
the cockpit, from start to finish, on a 3-hour flight from Almaty to
Atyrau in Kazakhstan in an A320 that our Company had chartered. I was
in the jump seat between the captain and FO. There was a crew of 6 and
there were 6 passengers in a 150-capacity aircraft

There were two very friendly Canadian pilots who didn't think much of
answering my Qs - and there were a few Qs

Apart from learning quite a bit, I also unlearned the following:

a. There's a stick to pilot the aircraft and not a U-shaped control
column.
b. Cockpits don't contain a drove of dials and needles, but are
completely digital.
c. Planes aren't turned during taxiing using the rudder but have a
lovely little device that controls the nosewheel.
d. Brakes aren't manually applied upon landing but are preset.
e. Pilots pay a lot more than passing attention to wake vortices.
Indeed, the captain waited for almost five minutes on the runway
before deciding to takeoff since a huge Russian cargo plane took off
prior to our departure.

Being the friendly chaps, the pilots allowed me to disengage the
autopilot and bank the aircraft as much as I liked during cruise and I
think I did a decent job of maintaining the correct heading because
upon re-engagement of the autopilot, the correction it had to do was
almost imperceptible. The captain also let me throw open the throttle
for takeoff, although his hand was snug above mine

The weather was quite rough at the end of the ride, with very low
visibility, making the landing thrilling.

For all the unbelievable sensation, I must confess that the experience
left me feeling that piloting is a mite too staid and has this
ineffable remoteness to it. I really hadn't known that planes have
this degree of automation... I mean, the things can nigh fly
themselves. Not sure now I want that; I'd reckoned flying to be a lot
more raw, honestly. There wasn't one moment where I experienced the
raw feeling one gets while driving a car or motorcycle. And I wasn't
even on some small, unsophisticated airplane. I know you'll be gasping
at how silly I could be for saying this but that's what I felt anyways
:\

Ramapriya