2012 Drala Region Encampment

I just returned from my first encampment that SMCC Rusung, L.Cpl. Gregory Gilkerson, helped coordinate in the mountains of North Carolina.

The encampment was held on thirty-five acres of beautiful land adjacent to Chimney Rock State Park and could be reached by only by trails through the woods over mountains. It is perfectly named “Drala Point.”

During encampment I enjoyed waking at 5:00AM, lighting a kitchen fire and making gallons of camp coffee silently over an open flame. Then, before dawn, savoring the sound of crickets and the sanctuary of silence in our camp kitchen while almost no one else was awake. The machen, Kenchen Geoffrey Warren from Atlanta, is a gentle man from Jamaica with a beautiful lilting voice, powerful presence and capable of holding a very strong practice container. I loved entering his kitchen and standing silently with him and the others to help prepare breakfast until we all became fully present and awake – then bowing.

Each day consisted of cooking, cleaning, calisthenics, practice, work detail and drill. We also experienced three hot delicious meals each day in the silence of a bright, cold shrine room carpeted with grass and adorned with a vast and undulating horizon interrupted only by the near form of a few gracious trees.

On Friday my work detail was to go into the woods searching for juniper with which we would create our lhasang. The trees were all found only after a long search. We discovered them in a high field interspersed among the bones of white lichen-covered apple trees in full decay rising hauntingly above the tall green grass. There we bowed to each and every juniper and quietly chanted the vajrasattva mantra while gathering clippings from them all.

+ + +

L.Cpl. Gregory Gilkerson wrote “Drala Regional Encampment 2012 Was a powerful program and a huge success. With open hearts and minds, 35 Dorje Kasung came together for five days in the mountains of North Carolina. Dapon Will Ryken and DKSM Anna Weinstein presided over the encampment and enriched our lives… Thank You to everyone who attended and to countless members of the Dorje Kasung who gave so generously of their time and energy to create this encampment. Special thanks to Kenchen Warren and Burgess Kado for your culinary skills in keeping the troops fed.I hope we can do it again next year.

Yours In The True Command,
L.Cpl. Gregory Gilkerson