The front-facing guardian dogs of Kanda Myojin were muscular

I continue to wonder about Komainu, the guardian dog. There is no strict rule that says they cannot be called Komainu unless they look like this. Despite looking somewhat the same, they are each unique. Some of them are A-Un guardian dogs, some are feeding their young, some are holding a ball, and some are not dogs at all. All in all, they form a category of "Komainu," or "guardian dogs," and it is like a loose confederation.

In front of the steel-framed reinforced concrete shrine pavilion completed in 1934, a large set of Komainu (guardian dogs) dedicated by volunteers face the Zuijin-mon Gate with their limbs braced on the ground. The left guardian dog has its mouth firmly closed, while the right one is open, which seems to represent A-Un. It's likely that the two Komainu, which aren't holding any balls, are faithful to their duties because they don't have any toys to play with. They were standing like guards at Buckingham Palace, looking straight ahead without paying any attention to me standing by their sides. Both of them were muscular, and if they were to feel uncomfortable in my presence, they would have been choked to death in a matter of seconds.

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