Japanese has three alphabets?

(berk, Mon 19 Sep 2011, 11:06, 1 reply, 14 years ago)

Yep
Katakana is for 'loan' words, words taken from Western languages. For example カメラ = ka me ra = camera

Hiragana is syllabic, used for Japanese words for which there are no kanji (but you can use it in place of kanji too, I think). For example みどり = mi do ri = green.

Kanji is not syllabic, is adapted from Chinese, each pictoral represents a word, and combinations can be made to make other words. There are thousands of different kanji, and each one can have more than one reading (context being used to distinguish the meanings). In other words, it's a fucking nightmare.
( Labia Majora You keep on talking but it makes no sense at all, Mon 19 Sep 2011, 11:56, Reply)