By luck, chance and fate (and some suspected behind-my-back bitchery), I am working alone for my AB214 negotiation project.

It was supposedly to be pair-work, and I was to work with this girl. However, with more time that we spend together on small in-class writing assignments, the more I feel that there will be clashes between the two of us.

Why do I say so? Well, we happen to have very different thinking and mindsets. She is very traditional, very 石板. Like that means like that, rules mean rules, and she refuses to look at newer perceptions. A stickler for rules and formality. Also, she is less empathic than me. It is clearly shown in her responses to some case scenarios. It's quite funny that me being a guy is more empathic than a woman. Actually, I get very annoyed with people like that. I can't stand stubborn people who cannot understand how people feel.

Moreover, we have different writing styles. She is very stubborn when it comes to her writing. She insists on writing HER WAY, and when we gave suggestions, she try to tweak our suggestions to fit her ideas. She also tends to dismiss and criticize ideas that seem ridiculous to her. The other two girls in my group don't mind that much, but I see it as very 固执 and unbending. I honestly believe that writing should be fluid, and writers should accept new ideas and look at writing at another angle. While I don't necessary agree on the way she writes, at least I don't criticize and be stubborn about it.

The straw that broke the camel's back came when she told me, after I tried to suggest that the paragraph can just exist with one sentence, "Paragraphs SHOULD never consist of one sentence". I was shell shocked with disbelief. For years, writing one-sentence paragraphs has always been part of my writing style, and my teachers have NEVER told me that it was wrong. Why can't paragraphs consist of one-sentence, if they make stylistic, grammatical and logical sense?

After hearing that, I got so personally offended. My beliefs that her being an unbending stubborn mule are reaffirmed, and from then on, I withdrew from group discussion. I do join in every now and then, but whenever she attacks my ideas, I just give a black face and withdraw from the conversation.

I think by now, after 2 weeks of giving her black faces, she got the hint that working with me isn't gonna result in anything substantial. That's why I highly suspect that her moving to another group was her own way of saving herself, and that's why I was given a cock-and-bull story about how come the three of the girls are doing the project together (I am too lazy to type out everything; just ask me if you are interested in what they came up with).

Not that I minded the underhandedness though, because the result is mutually beneficial to all the parties involved. I am no longer stuck with her, and she can feel free to dominate the other two girls with her writing style without looking at my black faces. Anyway, I was ready to suggest that we work alone, and was ready to tell my tutor that we cannot work together due to "irreconcilable differences". Luckily I didn't have to air any dirty laundry in public, and that my tutor is very easy-going about such things. She just gave her blessings to us. =)

So, yay! I can finally write my one-sentence paragraphs without feeling stifled! Thank goodness for behind-the-back bitchery (well, it takes a master of bitchery to appreciate the high level of bitchery that was done to me =p)! =D