The incense was there. So was the tikka powder and the ceremonial grains of rice. So were the turbans, the saris, and the kurta pajamas. The wedding had all of the makings of a Hindu shaadi, but in one major way, it was far from traditional.

When Neil Bajpayee, a Pennsylvania-born Indian-American, made his vows in Sanskrit to Stephanie Young, a Californian raised in a non-religious family, he became the first member of his family to marry a non-Indian, non-Hindu.

Shukavak Dasa, the Hindu priest marrying the couple, had seen it all before.

Weddings between Indian-American Hindus and non-Hindus are rare. Pew Research reported  as many as 94 percent of Hindus in the U.S. were married to other Hindus in 2012. But even if interfaith Hindu weddings are uncommon now, Dasa sees them as a growing trend.

“In general Indian parents don’t like [interracial, interfaith marriages]; they would like their children to marry nice Indian boys and girls in their own community,” Dasa said, but, he added, “We have a lot of parents who are now saying, ‘I don’t really care, as long as my children are happy.”’

And that is when Dasa comes in. His specialty is interfaith Hindu weddings.

Dasa, 60, is white. He was raised in Canada in an Anglican family. He took an interest in Eastern religions as a teenager, then studied Sanskrit and Indian studies at the University of Toronto, where he earned a Ph.D. in Eastern theology. Along the way, he also became a devout practitioner of Hinduism. Then in the early ‘80s, he performed his first Hindu wedding.

“I had never even seen a Hindu wedding!” Dasa said, with a laugh.

Decades later, weddings have become Dasa’s main business. He is based in Riverside, where he is the head priest of Shri Lakshmi Narayan Temple. He performs many Hindu-to-Hindu weddings.

But word of mouth has made him a go-to officiant for Hindu mixed-religious weddings, not just in Southern California, but also worldwide. He has married couples around the U.S. and in places as far away as Russia and Hong Kong.

Dasa said that when he started out, there were few Hindu priests in California. But as South Asian communities have grown in the state, so has the demand for wedding officiants. And he has noticed Hindu priests finding niches.

“The Gujarati priest will work with the Gujarati community, the Punjabi priest will work with the Punjabi community, and so on like that,” Dasa said, “The typical scenario for me is, a young Hindu boy or girl goes off to college, falls in love with a Jewish, Christian or non-Hindu partner and wants to get married. ‘Oh, God, what can you do? Call the priest who can put one foot in both worlds.’”

Dasa, who is on faculty at the Claremont School of Theology, applies classroom-teaching skills while officiating weddings, taking time to explain Hindu customs. During the Bajpayee-Young wedding in Pasadena last May, he coached the bride’s parents through Sanskrit prayers and explained the symbolism behind the small flame, the flower garlands, and each part of the ceremony to the diverse crowd.

Bajpayee pointed out that many of his Hindu relatives had never understood what had been going on during their own weddings. “There’s just this norm in Hindu ceremonies that it’s not understandable sometimes,” he said, adding that his family members enjoyed Dasa’s informative approach to the ceremony.

Dasa is willing to customize ceremonies to fit the wishes of the couple. Bajpayee and Young, for example, asked for a shortened version of a traditional Hindu ceremony, which sometimes can last hours.

Dasa also worked with the couple to create a ceremony with more equal gender roles.

“One of the vows, literally if you translated it, was like, ‘As your wife I promise to cook you a hot meal every night,’” Young said, “I looked at it not with a lot of judgment, but I thought if I were to go through this, I wouldn’t want that.”

Dasa knows not every Hindu would agree with his willingness to occasionally break traditions. But he feels that adaptability is important for keeping millennia-old customs relevant.

Dasa, who said it took his own parents several years to feel comfortable with his conversion to Hinduism, understands some families’ hesitations about their children straying from the flock.

“I know for a fact that a Christian marrying a Hindu is not going to be as Christian and a Hindu is not going to be as Hindu, in general. So in some ways, we’re facilitating the watering down [of faith],” Dasa said. “But the other side of it is, we’re facilitating life.”

Dasa has a wife of nearly 40 years who is also a Hindu. Together, they have nine adult children, a few of whom are married. Some have chosen to have Hindu weddings, others have chosen blended or secular ceremonies. Though Dasa is a man of devout faith, he said he is happy to see his children, as well as the hundreds of young couples who he has married, choose their own spiritual paths.

Weddings, regardless of their religious style, Dasa said, “are all joyous.”

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On a Tuesday night in late April, the five members of the creative team behind Watts Village Theater Company’s upcoming  “Meet Me @Metro” program gathered for their first round of auditions. Sitting at the end of the table was Lynn Manning, who started as the company’s new artistic director early this year.

“I was hesitant [to take over as artistic director] because I was enjoying being out of the game for the few months that I had been out of it,” Manning said in an interview. “I had been able to focus on my own personal career.”

But for Manning, taking on the role of artistic director is something of a homecoming. One of the company’s original founders, he is returning after a brief hiatus from the company.

Manning, 58, is a seasoned performer, playwright and poet, but his path to show business has hardly been traditional. For one thing, he happens to be blind. He lost his eyesight after being shot in the face 35 years ago. It’s just one piece of a rocky history he has had with his hometown of Los Angeles.

Home has proven to be such a complicated subject for Manning that he chose to explore it as the theme of the first show that he will lead as artistic director of the Watts Village Theater Company.

During auditions Manning, the show’s two directors, and the show’s curator Gamal Palmer looked for actors who could write, play music, and who could creatively approach the subject of home.

“What does home mean to you?” Palmer asked one actress who came to audition.

“It’s more of a feeling,” the young woman said, speaking of heart, family, and warmth.

For many people, home does bring warm feelings. For Manning, it’s not so simple.

“Home isn’t always a positive place to go,” Manning said. “In fact, sometimes home is a place you need to get away from.”

One of nine children, Manning was born to a single mother in South Los Angeles.

“She eventually crawled into a bottle and neglected us,” Manning said.

Around age 10, Manning, along with his eight siblings, began a migratory journey around Los Angeles, moving from foster care to group homes. Even with an unstable upbringing, Manning had begun to find his path by his early 20s. He finished high school and had even started working as a counselor at the group home in the Mid Wilshire District where he had spent his teenage years. Then, at the age of 23, Manning went out to a bar in Hollywood where he got into a fight with a stranger. Later that night, the stranger returned with a gun and shot Manning in the head. Manning was spared his life, but lost his vision.

“There was a need to redefine my dreams after that,” Manning said.

He had had an interest in pursuing painting, but with visual art no longer an option, he began studying at the Braille Institute and taking English classes at LACC. Poetry became his creative outlet. Manning said he was surprised to find poetry and performing arts came so naturally to him.

“None of this stuff was a part of my life as a kid growing up. My South Central life didn’t involve theater; it didn’t involve poetry beyond greeting card stuff,” Manning said. “I didn’t know this stuff could speak to me.”

The support of the artistic community gave Manning a feeling of encouragement.

“The audience response to my poetry recitals got me interested in the performer-audience dynamic,” Manning said. “I needed some more of that immediate gratification, so I got into acting.”

A televised production of David Rabe’s 1976 play “Streamers” was the first piece of theater to inspire him, Manning said.

“At the time I saw it I was living in a group home where homophobia and fear of cohabiting with different races of people was an issue,” Manning said. “When I saw that play I saw people I knew. I saw circumstances that I was familiar with. I wanted to be able to tell stories like that.”

When Manning began to study acting he felt even more need to share his experiences onstage.

“In my scene work I played characters that weren’t [visually impaired],” Manning said. “That was good, but I thought there were stories to be told about living blind in a sighted world.”

His first play, a one-act called “Shoot!” about a blind man trying to buy a gun, caught the attention of the Mark Taper Forum’s writing workshop and was later published in the anthology “Beyond Victims and Villains: Contemporary Plays by Disabled Writers.” He also won a Drama-Logue Critics Award for his trilogy of plays, “Beyond the Blink.”  But while his fictional works were successful, it was his own story that gained him international recognition. His autobiographical solo show “Weights,” took him from Los Angeles to the Kennedy Center earning him an NAACP award, and praise in the L.A. Times and New York Times along the way. Since 2001, he has performed his life story at a festival for blind actors in Croatia, the world famous Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland, and The Adelaide Fringe Festival in Australia. Just this April, he performed the play for an international high school in France. Manning’s solo career was taking him around the world, but his personal and creative roots remained in South L.A.

He had founded the Watts Village Theater Company in 1996 with fellow actor, Quentin Drew. Their mission had been to bring professional quality theater into the underserved South L.A. community of Watts. Before Drew died of cancer in 2005, Manning said they had discussed the possibility of him taking over as artistic director of the company. But Manning declined because he did not feel right for the role. He was enjoying a solo career, he knew the amount of work required to run a community theater, and his creative endeavors were already becoming a burden on his marriage, which ended in 2011. When Drew’s successor, Guillermo Aviles-Rodriguez resigned as artistic director at the end of 2012, Manning was asked a second time if he would take on the responsibility of leading the company.

“They could have done a citywide search and put the word out,” said John Freeland Jr., a longtime friend of Manning’s and stage manager for “Meet Me @Metro,” “but to bring a whole other energy in who doesn’t understand what the condition of the company is—it could be daunting for someone. Lynn knows the ins and outs, so it was just natural.”

Manning had a strong personal connection with the Watts Village Theater Company, but he had not envisioned himself as the company’s creative leader. Now that he has been in the role for a few months, Manning said he is “enjoying being able to map out future productions for the company.”

But the first production Manning was called upon to lead was the company’s most well known. “Meet Me @Metro” is a project that the Watts Village Theater Company has produced annually for the past three years. It invites playgoers to ride the Metro line—a different route every year—hop off, then watch performances near the stops. Last year, the production grew to include several Metro stops and dozens of performers.

“It was a long thing and it got longer,” Manning said, with a quiet laugh. “[Last year’s production] was fairly interminable.”

In addition to its length, Manning worried the production was losing its artistic value and its connection to Watts. Under Manning’s direction, “Meet Me @Metro” which will take place on Memorial Day weekend, will be much simpler. He has chosen to limit the show to the two Metro stops in Watts.

Depicting Los Angeles is important to Manning. He describes his main mission as telling South L.A. stories that don’t usually appear onstage.

But Manning acknowledges that his Los Angeles, heavy with the memories of a childhood in foster care, is not the only version of the city. In fact, Manning has surrounded himself with a creative team with a variety of backgrounds. He is the only L.A. native among them. He hopes the diversity of perspectives will make show’s theme will work.

As Ryan Anderson, one of the directors on the production explained, “the theme of home is just such a universal one that no matter what we do, there’s going to be a relationship. There’s going to be something somebody can connect with wherever they live.”

Manning’s goal is not so much to explain and depict his experience of home to theatergoers—that’s what he has already done with his solo play around the world. Instead, for his first big production after his return to the Watts Village Theater Company, he is inviting audiences and artists from around Los Angeles to converge in his home, South L.A., and share their ideas with him.

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Chrystal Lee wasn’t shy about asking L.A. City Councilwoman and mayoral candidate Jan Perry and L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey to pose for a photo with her two daughters, Sarah, 16 and Love, 5 months.

“It’s Martin Luther King’s birthday, and we have the Presidential inauguration,” Lee said. “Not only that, but we have Jan Perry and Jackie Lacey here. So that’s history on top of history on top of history. This is something I had to do to create a memory for my girls.”

Lee was one of about 400 attendees at the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Community Breakfast hosted by the San Fernando Valley African American Leadership Organization in the gym of the Pacoima Boys and Girls Club.

Lacey, the first woman and first African American to serve as D.A., was the keynote speaker at this morning’s event and as San Fernando Valley African American Leadership Organization president Robert Winn introduced her, he described how proud Martin Luther King Jr. might be today to see the diversity of local elected officials. He highlighted the important role African Americans play in L.A. politics.

He’s right. According to Raphael Sonenshein, executive director of the Pat Brown Institute at California State University, Los Angeles and author of “Politics in Black and White: Race and Power in Los Angeles,” African Americans have played a significant role in Los Angeles politics in recent decades.

“The African American vote was the core of the rise of liberal politics in Los Angeles,” Sonenshein said.

In mayoral elections, like the one that will decide Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s successor this spring, the African American vote is especially important. Though only about one in ten Angelenos is African American, Sonenshein said, “After [Mayor Tom Bradley’s] five terms, the candidate who wins a majority of the black vote—with one exception, Richard Riordan—has won the election.”

For Chrystal Lee the choice in the upcoming mayoral election is obvious.

“When I heard that [Jan Perry] was running for mayor—oh my god—that just made my heart happy,” she said.

Lee dislikes Villaraigosa as a mayor because, as she sees it, “He only has his political interests at heart, he’s not really concerned about what’s going on.”

By contrast, Lee said, “Any time the community is having any [event] I always see [Jan Perry] there and I like that. I like that she’s an easily accessible person. She’s really down-to-earth. She’s a likable person.”

If Jan Perry is elected, she will be the second African American and the first woman to serve as the city’s mayor. Perry emphasizes that she is campaigning to all Angelenos though, saying she wants votes based on her track record as a City Councilwoman and that she wants black voters to know, “Your voices will be heard, as will everyone’s voice.”

Robert Winn supports Jan Perry for mayor too. However, he said members of his organization, which represents black churches, businesses, and community organizations in the Valley, have varying opinions on the election.

“We’re trying to elect the best person—if they’re not African American, so be it. As long as they’re representing the diversity of the community, that’s what we’re mostly concerned about,” Winn said, adding that he doesn’t want only black politicians in office, but a group of leaders that represents L.A.’s entire population.

If Jan Perry doesn’t make the final run off for mayor following the March 5 primary, Winn said he will support City Councilman Eric Garcetti. “Eric represents every diverse corner of the city,” he said.

Sonenshein said Garcetti is leading among Latino voters and tends to appeal to a multiracial constituency. Garcetti made nods to both African American and Latino communities when he spoke at the Empowerment Congress Summit Mayoral Candidates Forum at USC’s Bovard Auditorium on Saturday, taking time to acknowledge Martin Luther King Day and President Obama’s inauguration during his opening remarks then sending out a “thank you” in Spanish during his closing statement. He also marched in the annual Kingdom Day Parade in South L.A. on Saturday morning.

City Controller and mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel did not attend any local Martin Luther King Day events today because she had to go out of town for family reasons. However, her campaign has not lost sight of reaching out to African Americans. She recently opened a field office on Crenshaw Blvd. in South L.A. and lists over 70 African American endorsements on the “African Americans with Wendy” section of her campaign website.

Sonenshein pointed out that Greuel often refers to her early political career working for Tom Bradley, the first, and to-date only, African American mayor of Los Angeles, when campaigning in South L.A.

As of now, Garcetti and Greuel lead the race in terms of fund raising and poll numbers. After the March 5 primary, if no candidate has a clear majority of votes, the top two candidates will participate in a run off election on May 21.

Perry currently leads among African American voters, but if she doesn’t make the run off, Sonenshein said whoever gets the endorsements from African American elected officials like City Councilman Bernard Parks, County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, or Congresswoman Maxine Waters will have a better shot at L.A.’s African American votes.

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