King Solomon and I

I'm enrolled in a class on Conflict Resolution, and each week, we're given a scenario where we have to represent one of the parties in a conflict. We then have to negotiate a resolution, if we can, based on shared facts, and then private facts provided by the "client". Usually this takes about an hour of haggling back and forth, and I usually have to do it in Japanese, which always makes me giddy with excitement.

I had a negotiation scenario the other day which involved a car manufacturer and a person who was injured as a result of a defect in the cruise control of a car made by the aforementioned manufacturer. Of course, with my luck being what it is, I got to represent the evil car manufacturer. But my opponent was another exchange student who speaks fluent English, and both of us are fed up with having to do negotiations week-in week-out. My instruction was to negotiation a settlement to within 100 million yen, and get the opposition to sign a confidentiality agreement. And so our negotiation went like this...

[Me] How much do you want?
[Him] 100 million yen and a new car.
[Me] How about 100 million yen, no new car, and you don't tell anyone about this.
[Him] Ok.
[Me] Ok.

Score! And in under 10 seconds. I am a world-class negotiator, boys and girls! King Solomon ain't got nuthin on me when it comes to conflict resolution skills....