Tome Ogata

**Overview**
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* Manga
* Anime

**Tome Ogata** (尾形 トメ, *Ogata Tome*) was a mistress of Koujirou Hanazawa and the mother of Hyakunosuke Ogata.

## Appearance

Tome appeared to be of average height and build. As she only was seen in Ogata's memories, much of her face remained in shadows. She would wear her hair in a shimada hairstyle with some strands falling down in a messy fashion. As Tome struggled to take care of her appearance, her kimono would often fall down her shoulders.

While cooking, she wore a decorative kimono folded up to her elbows and a plain looking apron around her waist. She also had a bandana covering her hair, with a few strands hanging in her face, similar to her son.

## Personality

After being abandoned by Koujirou Hanazawa, Tome appeared to have lost much of her mental capacity, continuing to cook anglerfish nabe over and over in hopes of her lover to return to her. Her deteriorating mental health left her emotionally closed off and unable to properly care for her son Hyakunosuke.

## Background

As remembered by Ogata, his mother was a geisha from Asakusa that entered an affair with Koujirou Hanazawa. Tome got pregnant with a son, much to Hanazawa's embarrassment, as it was unbecoming of a man of his rank to father a child with a geisha. After he was able to conceive a son with his legal wife, Koujirou Hanazawa stopped visiting Tome and his son, which eventually led to decline in Tome's psyche. Later, Ogata's grandmother took her daughter and grandson back to the family seat in Ibaraki.

Over time, Ogata grew frustrated with his mother's mental state, whose compulsive behavior resulted in her constantly cooking anglerfish nabe in hopes that Hanazawa would visit them again. After numerous attempts to catch his mother's attention, Ogata poisoned her while his grandparents were away. Ogata thought that his father would finally come to Tome's funeral, thus fulfilling his mother's dream of Koujirou coming back. Unfortunately, Koujirou never came to say goodbye to Tome.

## Trivia

* In 2018 Golden Kamuy All-Stars popularity poll Tome ranked 47th, gaining 743 votes.
* In Chapter 187, when Hyakunosuke Ogata lied to Asirpa, he said the name of the woman Saichi Sugimoto liked was **Tome**, which is in fact his mother's name.
* Tome's surname *Ogata* means "tail" (尾) (*o*) and "form shape, type" (形) (*hata*/*gata*).
* The name *Tome* means "Stop", "No more children" and was commonly given to daughters in poor families who couldn't afford to have more children.
* In Episode 19, director Nanba Hitoshi inserted a scene showing Tome holding baby Hyakunosuke. The scene was added because director thought Tome didn’t dislike her son and he wanted to express it in the anime.
	+ Nanba Hitoshi also explained that he thought it was Tome who originally liked anglerfish nabe, and Hanazawa Koujirou came to like it when he was in a relationship with her. Eventually, it ended up becoming Hyakunosuke’s favourite food as well.
* Before 1904, geishas used makeup which contained lead. This could result in lead poisoning, a condition that causes a variety of symptoms, among which are behavioral problems and decrease in cognitive abilities. It's possible Tome's poor mental health could be explained by the lead that accumulated in her body over the years of using makeup in her geisha routine.

## References

1. ↑ 「ゴールデンカムイ北海道オールスターズ総選挙」
2. ↑ Golden Kamuy Hunting
3. ↑ 小檜山青 Sei Kobiyama, @Sei\_Kobeee, Twitter
4. ↑ REPORT: Golden Kamuy staff talk event 19 April 2019
5. ↑ REPORT: Golden Kamuy staff talk event 19 April 2019
6. ↑ Cultural History of cosmetics
7. ↑ Lead poisoning and health