Got up at 9 with a heavy head. In space there’s a remedy for a headache — exercise till the seventh sweat. For a bad mood — work. In flight you must constantly keep yourself in check, control every word. That’s hard. But the most exhausting thing, in my view, is the frequent communication with the ground. The constant conversations on every orbit: discussions, arguments, receiving and transmitting service information.

Today I reviewed the optical sights, comparing their fields of view, magnifications, and ease of use. Now we’re repairing a cassette of the autonomous telemetry recorder — not going well. The rollers won’t release; can’t reach the mechanism. Tried removing the cover — impossible, the screws were painted over, the slot is small, and no fitting screwdriver. Somehow through the cassette window I turned a gear with a screwdriver and released the rollers.

On orbit 2324 we came upon the Himalayas. Flying along the chain of mountain peaks. Before us is Tibet, a yellow high-altitude plateau with an orange tint — a beautiful color. On it, individual mountain blocks in gleaming glacier armor, with the pure blue of lakes like the eyes of the planet. The dimensions and color of the plateau are very impressive, unusual for other places. To my right, mountain peaks stretch east to west, and beyond them India — a dark green plain where the Ganges gleams like steel. I peer, looking for Everest, and see several peaks protruding above the general snowy ridge. These seem to have withstood all winds, not crumbled by time, standing like pyramids with their spires piercing the clouds. There are several eight-thousanders in this region. Which is Everest is hard to tell from up here. One looks like a ski jump — perhaps that’s Everest; then I found it. We passed farther along the Himalayas and crossed them.

I reflected on our profession: many believe, and the press bears no small blame, that its main difficulty is constant physical training amid the constant danger and great risk to life of our work. What’s really primary is the mundane labor over many years — days, years sitting at a desk at work and at home. Books, books, documents, drawings, technical descriptions, lectures. This is dozens upon dozens of exams passed, not one-on-one with some specialist but before a commission of 10 to 20 people for every system. You must know the entire spacecraft, the station, the operation of all systems in every conceivable situation — standard and non-standard — repairs, scientific equipment, communications. And of course competition — several crews train for each flight, all under the watchful eyes of hundreds of specialists, doctors, and colleagues.

The main thing in our profession is the discovery of oneself through the enormous volume of knowledge offered to you. You are your own judge regarding the reliability of the information you provide. You can’t give free rein to imagination, which often provokes conjecture. And our danger, I’ll say directly, is no greater than in many other professions: miners, pilots, divers. Our most dangerous phases are orbital insertion and descent; the orbital flight itself proceeds in calm, stationary conditions.