Bhakti Fest draws more than 1,500 to Joshua Tree retreat center



10:00 PM PDT on Saturday, September 19, 2009

By MARK MUCKENFUSS
The Press-Enterprise

Video: Bhakti Fest 2009

Photo Gallery: Bhakti Fest 2009

JOSHUA TREE - "Stretch your hands out, feel the blue sky. Feel the sun energy
dance with the moonlight within us. Feel ourselves, the universe of universes."

Nandhi, an Indian yogi, stood with his hands pressed together, a microphone
between them. Dressed only in a calf-length plain muslin lungi, a type of Indian
skirt, and a colorful turban, the diminutive spiritual leader with a
salt-and-pepper beard lifted his face to the sky and led a gathering of several
hundred people in a chant.

"Come into oneness," he said and then repeated, "Manuuuayoon."
Story continues below
Rodrigo Peña / The Press-Enterprise
Robyn Benensohn, front center, 44 and Tom Baldwin, right, 50, take part in the
opening worship ceremony of the Bhakti Fest 2009

Beneath a sizzling noontime desert sun, the crowd followed his chant, circling
an open fire while dropping into it bits of camphor.

This was the opening of last weekend's Bhakti Fest -- bhakti is a Hindu term for
devotion -- at the Desert Retreat Center in Joshua Tree. Also known as the
Institute of Mental Physics, the center was founded in 1948 by Edwin J. Dingle,
a surveyor who spent time in Tibet and devoted himself afterward to sharing what
he learned there. He eventually changed his name to Ding Le Mei and hosted
retreats here, bringing in spiritual leaders from around the world.

In recent years, executive director Victoria Jennings has focused on renovating
the property and reinvigorating its offerings. Only three employees were working
on site when she arrived four years ago. Now, she says, between 30 and 40 people
are on staff.

Meditation, yoga and consciousness-raising programs fill out much of the event
schedule at the center. But it also offers such things as a monthly drum circle
and weekly life drawing classes. Last weekend's gathering was its largest recent
endeavor, drawing between 1,500 and 2,000 people. Some traveled from other
countries to be part of a festival that merged three days of nonstop kirtan -- a
chant-oriented music rooted in Hindu traditions -- with yoga.

"This Bhakti Fest, I always felt it was a coming-out party," Jennings said,
adding that the center was the ideal place for the event. "People go to the
desert to find who they are. When I first came out here, I remember saying, 'The
silence is so deep here, it awakens you.' "

And awakening people is the primary mission of the center, she said. The complex
of buildings, which can accommodate 280 guests, sits on just a small portion of
the center's 420 acres, which are laced with hiking trails.

"We have labyrinths, sweat lodges, a medicine wheel, a fire pit. Where else can
you get all that?" Jennings said.

Sridhar Silberfein, 59, heads the Center for Spiritual Studies in Yucca Valley.
He said he organizes three to four events per year that bring together various
spiritual leaders and musical groups.

"We do programs all over the country," Silberfein said.

But when the idea arose to mount a festival combining kirtan and yoga, he
thought it best to do it close to home. One of the most active kirtan
communities is in Los Angeles, which made it an easy drive for many of the
musicians. Many of them said they had never before heard of the center.

Taking place on the heels of the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, Silberfein
couldn't help equating the mood of the two events.

"It's bringing devotion, compassion, love, remembering 9/11," he said. "What
better way of relating than gathering in love and harmony? We can help to heal a
lot of the stuff that's going on."
Story continues below
Tapasyogi Nandhi, left, 43, of Los Angeles, leads the crowd in the opening
ceremony of the event held in Joshua Tree.

The new-age aspect of the festival was pervasive. Attendees were handed bottles
of H2Ohm water at the registration desk. Devotees lined up early to get into
sessions with top yoga instructors that filled to capacity. Vendors sold
everything from anti-electrostatic meditation mats to organic vegan food to
healing crystals.

Sophia Neomanim, 45, of Albuquerque, N.M., was selling large paintings of
mandalas when she wasn't dancing to the kirtan music in the shaded amphitheater.
Dressed in a multicolored flowing skirt, a tie-died cropped top and ribbons in
her braided hair, Neomanim was clearly in the "bhav" or mood.

"My brothers and sisters, we have come here to invoke the love we have for one
another, experiencing our infinity," said Neomanim, who teaches yoga and dance
fusion. She has been on an alternative path since she was 20, she said. "A
friend of mine invited me to a spiritual lecture. The whole entire time I just
cried and cried. It was so familiar to me. I said, 'This is it. I've arrived
home.' "

When she heard about the festival, she said, she had to come.

"It's Saturday morning and we're all here singing songs for love, for God," she
said and then began chanting "hare Krishna" along with the live kirtan singers.

Near the back of the crowd, Doug Peterson, 67, of San Diego, sat in a folding
camp chair.

Dressed more conservatively than many of the attendees -- in a straw hat, shorts
and sandals and sporting a trimmed gray beard -- when pressed, he described
himself as an old hippie. A longtime yoga devotee, he said he was drawn to the
festival to be among like-minded people.

"This community probably has its roots in the '60s, but you see a lot of younger
people," he said. "It's evolved from the '60s. This, I think, is more grounded
in the spiritual," rather than the rebellion that shaped much of the earlier
movement.

"If you're receptive, you'll walk away energized," Peterson said. "It's too big,
it's too powerful not to be affected by it. You get a positive collective
consciousness that can overwhelm you."

Some were hoping that energy would be creative beyond the festival.

A Los Angeles musician, who goes by the single name of Govindas and performs
with his wife Radha, saw the event as a unique gathering of the Southern
California kirtan community.

"There have been festivals that have had small amounts of kirtan," the blond
dreadlocked Govindas said, "but nothing that has focused on nonstop kirtan for
three days. I see this as a real beginning of something. I think it will only
grow."

David Daunch, 37, of Los Angeles, who was wheeling his fussing five-month-old
son Taj in a stroller while his wife attended a yoga session, said he thinks
more people are looking for non-Western spiritual fulfillment.

"To see a yoga studio open up on Main Street in Santa Monica, and the classes
are full, it's more than a fad," Daunch said. "People are getting turned on to
the ancient wisdom and pausing a moment to listen. People are waking up."

Reach Mark Muckenfuss at 951-368-9595 or mmuckenfuss@...