Thse insights have been pulled from the individual experiences of astronauts and cosmonauts recorded in published first person accounts — journals, diaries, debriefs, and post-flight reflections.As this database includes the personal, subjective experiences from a diversity of flyers, they may sometimes contradict, but together they provide a more holistic, if messy, picture of life in space. To learn more about how these categories were developed, please see this related publication.
“After dinner, we went over to the Russian segment with gifts, per tradition, and had some chocolate pudding cake.”
A first time flyer noted that her veteran Russian colleagues would speak in English to her NASA colleagues, who in turn would respond in Russian, as a sign of mutual respect.