When Lakeside resident Amrita Huntington recently attended her son’s wedding in Mongolia, toasting the newlyweds with a cup of fermented mare’s milk wasn’t something she expected.

Neither was having a boiled sheep’s head — with eyes and teeth still intact — served on a platter during the reception.

Being part of a wedding ceremony rich in Mongolian tradition was the experience of a lifetime for Huntington, who works as a home-care provider in the Lakeside area.

Her son Gabriel and his bride Togtokh, the daughter of a prominent court justice in Mongolia, arrived on horseback at the wedding site in Terelj National Park. They were dressed in traditional Mongolian wedding regalia.

After dismounting their horses, the bride and groom were presented with a cup of fresh milk in a blue silk scarf. They shared the milk and passed it first to the bride’s father, then to other family members.

“This welcomes each other’s lives and then extends out, joining the family,” Huntington explained.

Each aspect of the wedding ceremony was steeped in tradition.

“The table before us had the traditional boiled sheep parts,” she said, noting how difficult it was to smell and witness this tradition because she’s a vegetarian. “Ganzorig, Togtokh’s dad, cut the head and passed it around. They all shared organ meat stew, another tradition.

“The wedding cake was stacked buns with curd cheese on top and you make a blessing as you touch the side of the cake, and then eat a piece of the curd.”

The buns later were delivered to people who lived too far away to attend the wedding.

“There was a goat hanging upside down from a tree outside the window, being smoked,” she continued, adding: “I didn’t ask.”

The entertainment included throat singers and a contortionist, along with traditional dancers, an opera singer and a song sung by the bride’s father to his daughter.

Huntington said she learned there’s an old Mongolian saying that if there is not a drunken scene, the wedding is boring. Suffice to say there was ample drinking, she said.

The following morning a tea ceremony was held, symbolizing the domesticity of the bride as she stokes the fire and makes the special butter tea.

“The father is served first, then her husband, then me, and her mother, then the gathering, and we stepped outside to pour it to the four directions,” Huntington recounted.

Afterwards, as Huntington spent time among the nomads — in the “ger” — she was impressed by the sense of family among Mongolia’s rural citizens.

“The families are very close,” she said. “Everyone cares for the children equally; they are so cherished. Six-year-olds carry around the babies and are fully trusted. It is beautiful.”

Huntington also was struck by the sense of liberation among the Mongolian people, who were freed from communist rule through a democratic revolution in early 1990, after communist regimes began breaking apart in the late 1980s. 

“There is a lot of joy there,” she said.

Huntington’s son met his wife while visiting Hawaii when he was a law student at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Togtokh had an adopted uncle who is a judge, and she was working for him in Hawaii.

The couple live in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he’s a lawyer and she’s attending law school.

Huntington brought a bit of Montana with her to Mongolia that was well-received.

“The Mongolians went crazy for huckleberries,” she said with a laugh.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.