The origin of this festival is rain-making rituals.
Now is more like for showing our gratitude to water.
The festival consists of offering tea ceremony, dancing and cooking ceremony in front of the Gods. Tea cremony, of course, cannot be done without water, so it's the symbolic ceremony of this festival. And the cooking ceremony is offered by the special cooking school called Ikuma school. (sorry, but only in Japanese.)
Ancestors of the Ikuma school used to be cookers for the Imperial family. It is said that the current master is 29th-generation of the family.
At the ceremony, he cooks a fish in front of the god without touching it by his hands at all. (The fish is altarage for Gods, so it shouldn't be touched by men.)
We know we cannot survive without water. However, we hardly thank it.Attending this festival was a good oppurnity to think about water.
Plus, kifune is a famous spot for Kawayuka (川床= on-river restaurant.) As it's in the middle of the mountain, the temprature in Kifune is about 3C (5F?) lower than that in the downtown Kyoto. Kyoto people know how to enjoy hot & humid summer!
