Roommate issues

[shall she sail seas]

She's 40-something (maybe), Vietnamese, been in Canada for 10+ years but can't speak coherent English, rather explosive temper when I make any complaints to her civilly. She didn't clean until I moved in and started taking the initiative to clean. And when I stopped, she complained. That led me to create a cleaning schedule, which I never had to do with past roommates. She puts on a pungent-smelling herbal ointment which I can't stand, and told her so. She took offense to it many times. She also took offense to the fact that I have asthma and allergic reactions to perfumes/dander/etc (wtf?)

Blah, blah, blah... that's the short story. If you want the longer version, it's here: http://www.thehellblog.com/?p=110
Read the comments too.

After she screamed at me for the third time earlier today when I told her to tone down the smell, I wrote a letter to my landlord saying I planned to move out in December if there was no change in the situation. He and his wife came by in the evening to discuss things with us. Throughout the entire discussion, my roommate repeatedly interupted me. My landlord, despite being the best landlord I've ever had, defended her adamantly. I can understand that because she is reliable with her payments and doesn't make any huge noises. However, he's never seen her screaming at me. His wife said that it was just her personality and that was her way of comunication, that I should have patience and adapt.

However, I've been living with her for 3 months already and my patience is wearing thin. She, being an older woman, simply by inaction, is placing a 24-year old spring chicken in a leadership role. I'm not very comfortable with that but I've already started adapting ever since I printed cleaning schedules a month ago. Actually, she demanded that I create the schedule after I suggested it to her. But despite this, she's very unreceptive to any sort of instruction/suggestion I give her (e.g. our balcony door is held open/closed by a rope. She doesn't know how to tie knots properly and hooked it to a post that was unstable. I told her it was unstable and said I could teach her, as someone with years of sailing experience, how to tie a proper and stable knot that was easy to undo. She refused to demonstrate how she tied knots when I asked and refused instruction, yelling at me even after I returned to my room).

I know that all I'm writing can sound very one-sided and I'm not going to hide that fact. However, I talk civilly and calmly during disputes. The greatest issue here seems to be that I'm starting to lose respect for her because of her past actions from June until now. However, it's as if she demands that I respect her constantly, as demonstrated in my previous paragraph. Either that, or I can't predict when she perceives I'm breaching some unwritten rule.

My landlord and my third roommate really want me to continue living here. The area is good and I've actually befriended a few of my neighbours. However, her increasing regularity of yelling at me is finally making me dread my walk back home every day.

Is there anything that you think I possibly could improve about myself? Is there anything I've missed that might be a character flaw on my part?

Nothing to do about her, and I have the option of moving. But there's still some time before December.  

[shall she sail seas]

Actually, I'm Chinese. It's not so much a cultural issue. Under the stereotype, she would be the one taking full leadership role instead of imposing it upon me while having the leeway to disregard the things she does not feel like doing. Likewise, my mom was pretty bossy (but simple and straightforward, thankfully) with me until I continued my studies in Canada. My original reluctance to take on that role was also because of this.

Not cultural.

Please continue.  

[shall she sail seas]

Yes and no.

Yes, when I hang out with friends and family of my generation, also with most relatives living in Canada once they've shown me they're comfortable with it.

No, when I'm back at home and/or talking to grandparents or anyone around that generation, also with any Asian elders who are strangers unless they prefer a more westernised interaction.

The latter generally requires me to be receptive, which is how I was until the cleanliness and health issues became too much for me to bear. Sitting down with both my roommates to discuss a cleaning schedule and taking the initiative to organise and print it out is completely outside of that norm.  

[shall she sail seas]

More like I have trouble figuring out what things she's receptive to and which I have to stay away from. From my past examples, why is it okay for me to take on a leadership role in creating a cleaning schedule while it's completely offensive to teach her to tie a stable knot in prevention of destroying landlord's property?

Is there a way to predict these things or am I merely playing with a human dice?  

[TheHellDevil]

And reckon I really should move out, then?  

[TheHellDevil]

lol. Nah. Her temperament has been pretty consistent throughout. I guess I should just move out then.  

[pretty hate machine]

After having a roommate from hell...

Honestly, it doesn't really matter what age they are, they're pretty much set in their ways. If it's almost impossible for you to solve any sort of conflict peacefully with this woman, it probably won't get better in the future. You two probably just have two differing personalities that don't mesh well, so you're better off either moving out or getting a new roommate.

At least that's my two cents.