「Vていった」 v.s. 「Vてきた」 in the case of 「お花しおれてっちゃった」


In the animated film _Spirited Away_ , there is a line (00:00:54) saying:
「お花しおれてっちゃった」, a contracted form of 「お花がしおれていってしまった」.

According to [this
page](http://www.coelang.tufs.ac.jp/mt/ja/gmod/contents/explanation/087.html)
by 東京外国語大学, the difference between 「Vていった」 and 「Vてきた」 mainly rests on the
positioning of the reference point on the time axis:

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/M91XZ.png)

I guess the concern of the heroine, who uttered that line, was on the flowers
in her hands at that moment. **Then why didn't she choose NOW as the reference
point and say 「お花しおれてきちゃった」 instead?**




I agree that the normal wording for this situation is, as you suggested,
お花しおれちゃった (if the flower had completely withered away when the girl saw it),
or お花しおれてきちゃった (if the flower was still withering).

And you are not the only one who thought this sentence was strange. There's a
question in Yahoo! 知恵袋 discussing this line:

<http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1030776410>

> ここでは、本当は「お花が萎れちゃった」って言うべきじゃありませんか。どうして「萎れてっちゃった」になったんでしょうか。説明お願いします。

I admit I'm also having trouble finding the definitive explanation why she
said しおれてっちゃった.

But 「自分の気持ちから離れる」, suggested in one of the answers in the linked question,
would be a possible explanation. She might have said しおれてっちゃった with [her
_mind_ as the reference
point](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/2322/5010), instead of some
particular time point. She might be trying to describe that the flower was
"(mentally) moving away from her", something like
"（大事にしていたのに）お花がしおれて、どこか遠くに行っちゃった".




I agree that the normal wording for this situation is, as you suggested,
お花しおれちゃった (if the flower had completely withered away when the girl saw it),
or お花しおれてきちゃった (if the flower was still withering).

And you are not the only one who thought this sentence was strange. There's a
question in Yahoo! 知恵袋 discussing this line:

<http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1030776410>

> ここでは、本当は「お花が萎れちゃった」って言うべきじゃありませんか。どうして「萎れてっちゃった」になったんでしょうか。説明お願いします。

I admit I'm also having trouble finding the definitive explanation why she
said しおれてっちゃった.

But 「自分の気持ちから離れる」, suggested in one of the answers in the linked question,
would be a possible explanation. She might have said しおれてっちゃった with [her
_mind_ as the reference
point](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/2322/5010), instead of some
particular time point. She might be trying to describe that the flower was
"(mentally) moving away from her", something like
"（大事にしていたのに）お花がしおれて、どこか遠くに行っちゃった".

