Robs' Blog: incoherencies from an american ex-pat in exotic beijing,
  or: how i learned to stop worrying and love bureaucracy

near the cross, by the mississippi mass choir, is playing on my ipod.

i have always had a visceral reaction to black southern-baptist music. my heartbeat slows-down, my eyes close, my neck and shoulders relax.

some of my fondest memories have been in black churches... from community baptist in santa rosa, ca, to the churches visited when i went to the 20th anniversary of the march in washington in 1983. (i vividly remember jesse jackson holding his hands high as the congregation yelled out "run, jesse, run".