～てくる To come to, To become, To continue, To be starting to, Has been ~ing

Most Recent Replies (51 in total)

• 

  Pushindawood

  to come to・to become
  to continue・starting to・has/have(had) been -ing

  Structure

  • Verb[ て ] + くる

  View on Bunpro

• 

  deltacat3

  What is も doing in this example sentence?

  あの女性は年取っても、綺麗なってきている。
  That woman is coming to be prettier even as she ages.

  I don’t think I have seen it attached to the て-form before,
  only with verb[る]+まで(も), as seen in まで(も).

• 

  s1212z

  It’s a later grammar point (N4L8)

• 

  deltacat3

  Ah crap another one! Though this one seems simple enough.
  Thanks for the rescue again s1212z! :D。

• 

  Neko

  In the sentence: お弁当を もってきて ください。
  Why is it てくる and not ていく? How would the meaning of the sentence change if I would use ていくinstead?

• 

  mrnoone

  Hey

  お弁当を もってきて ください
  お弁当を もっていって ください
  are both correct, and which should you use depends on what do you want to say. The first means to “bring” (to come with something towards the speaker), while the second one means “take” (to go with something from the speaker).

  It all comes to the difference between くる and いく：
  くる expresses movement towards the point of refence, and いく expresses movement from the point of reference.

  It can be either movement in space or in time.
  The point of reference is usually the speaker, or now (unless specified).
• 

  CrisH

  I’ve been a bit confused by the help text on this one:
  クリスマスが **** から、子供たちが色々なものを欲しがっている。
  It says “lit. has come to be near” and “is getting closer” - the first suggests past tense while the second suggests it’s continuative. I tried 近づいて来ている because it matched best with the English translation, but it didn’t like it. Is this just an unusual construction or is it actually wrong? Perhaps the translation could be amended to “Christmas has drawn near/er” to remove the ambiguity?

• 

  Pushindawood

  @CrisH I have updated this sentence to reflect your suggestion. Cheers!

• 

  atticusd

  Hi, hi, how is it going? I have a question about the first example.

  What would be the difference in meaning between:

  すぐ帰ってきて ね。
  and
  すぐ帰って ね。
  ?

  I am struggling to get the nuance on what this example is trying to teach us about てくる.

  Could you please help?

  Many thanks!

• 

  Pushindawood

  @atticusd Thank you for your question.

  TL;DR

  すぐ帰ってきてね = “Come back (towards) home soon.” - Said by someone who is at home and wishes for the listener to return (back) home soon.

  すぐ帰ってね = "Go home soon. - Said by someone who wishes the listener to return home. The speaker is not at or near the listener’s house.

  ---

  It might be easier to think of the first verb being changed into a conjunction.

  すぐ帰って could mean “go home soon (and…)” and not the request “go home soon.”

  Let’s use the conjunctive here: すぐ帰って (go home soon and…) + くる (come). Now that we have added くる (to come) at the end we realize that the speaker is referring to someone else coming towards themselves.

  Think of 帰る as just the act of “moving toward home” and くる as “coming toward” the speaker (who is at home). Since the movement in 帰る isn’t understood until we hav...

• 

  atticusd

  Many many thanks for the awesome and detailed explanation! It makes things much clearer. Bunpro surely rocks. Learning grammar with your system is a joy!

• 

  mrthuvi

  So I’ve got this dialogue in my book:

  女：どこへ行くの？
  男：このハガキを出しに行ってくる。帰りに何か買ってこようか？
  女：そうね、たまごを買ってきてくれない？

  These imply that the man will come back home after his errands, right?
  Also, the こよう form might be a good addition to the examples.

• 

  Pushindawood

  @mrthuvi

  That’s right! Once the man has taken the postcard to the post office, he asks the woman if he should buy anything on his way home.

  Since the volitional form is introduced in the s...

• 

  flowsnake

  私（わたし）はアメリカに帰（かえ）ってから、どんどん太（ふと）っ てきた 。

  Since coming back to America, I gradually have come to be fatter.

  Why is どんどん used for “gradually” and not だんだん？

• 

  Pushindawood

  Good spot! I have updated the translation to more closely reflect the rapidness of どんどん. Cheers!

• 

  Howl_UK

  Misa just added a really good, 40+ minute video for ていくand てくる a few weeks ago.
• 

  4m0n

  Note to those following the Tae Kim’s Grammar Guide path: the example 「すぐ帰ってきてね」can be confusing as the request part (きて) is covered later in Tae Kim’s Grammar Guide (in the “Making requests” chapter, ten chapters after the “Other uses of the te-form” where one learns about てくる).

• 

  Inounx

  Hey,
  I have trouble understanding the structure of this exemple sentence, and how can I get to the final translation :

  • お金がなくなってきた
  • I have started to lose money

  Breakdown:

  • お金がない => I have no money
    This is the base of the sentence

  • お金がなくなる => I become whithout money

  • お金がなくなってきた => I have come to become to have no money ?
    The logical literal translation would be instead : I have come to be in the state of becoming without money ? But I am not sure to understand what part could carry the “ing” (continuous change of state) of the becoming.

  Why not saying this :

  • お金がなくなっていてきた => I have come to becoming whithout money

  So it seems I am wrong in my translations somewhere, if someone could help me on this it would be great !
  Thanks

• 

  nekoyama

  I find it difficult to translate these literally, English just doesn’t work like that. But consider the non-chronological use, where the subject is literally arriving at a location:

  ぬいぐるみを持ってきた - I brought plush toys

  We can think of the entire first part of “ぬいぐるみを持って” as an adverbial phrase modifying きた that specifies in what way the subject arrived: I have arrived bearing plush toys.

  Let’s go back to the chronological sense:

  お金がなくなってきた - I have started to lose money

  We can give this the same treatment and interpret “お金がなくなって” as an adverbial phrase modifying きた that specifies in which way the subject arrived at the present point in time: I have arrived at this point in time losing money.

  In other words, losing money started at some point in the past and may still be going on.

  I find this pretty difficult to explain to be honest, so I tried to make a picture. I probably forgot some important things but maybe it’s still useful.

• 

  EdBunpro

  Holy smokes, awesome work here!