What's the opposite of 다가오다?

ANSWER: 다와가다

가다 means "to go," and 오다 means to come." One of the differences between Korean and English is that if your friend asked you in English, "Are you coming?" you could answer, "Yes, I'm coming," but in Korean you would have to answer, "Yes, I'm going" (응, 간다), not "Yes, I'm coming" (응, 온다).

다가오다 means someone or something is "coming near you" but is not there, yet. So, if you are on your way to visit a Korean friend and your friend calls you on your cell phone and asks, "다가오니?" it means "Are you almost here?" You cannot answer your friend by saying, "응, 다가온다" since you are still headed toward your friend and must, therefore, use 가다, not 오다. Instead, you could say, "응, 다와간다," meaning "Yes, I'm almost there." In written Korean, you would have to write it as "다 와 간다" since it is still considered a phrase, not a single word.

So, where does the "와" in "다와가다" come from? Here is my theory:

If you had just arrived at your destination when your Korean friend called and asked, "다가오니? ("Are you almost here?"), then you would have answered, "응, 다 왔어," which literally means "Yes, I've come (all the way)" but would be translated into English as "Yes, I'm here." Since you had arrived at your destination and were no longer "going toward it," you could no longer say 다와간다 since it uses the word 가다 (to go).

So, 다와간다 means you are near your destination but are still headed toward it, and 다 왔다 means you have arrived at your destination. That suggests that 다와간다 is a shortened version of "(거의) 다 와서 (아직) 간다," literally meaning "I've come all the way, but am still going."

So, what about the "가" in "다가오다"? Is it a shorted version of "(거의) 다 가서 (아직) 온다," literally meaning "He has gone all the way, but is still coming?"