During a festival held in the city of Tonami in Toyama prefecture, they had a small traditional dating back to the Edo Period which features live carp drinking sacred sake.

The carp are to drink a large dose of sake because many citizens believe that the carp symbolically take on people’s calamites. After drinking the sake, the fish are released into the river. It is said that the carp at first turn belly-up to the surface of the water after being released but they soon recover and swim off.

This seems like a bit of animal cruelty the way they just force the sake into the fish. I am glad though to know that the fish recover and continue to live.

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