>>85
I'm
>>77, and what struck me as smart about all that was that
- Around 3000 characters are in use. That's much, but an amount that can actually be easily learned within a few years, as opposed to all those the Chinese use, where everyone is technically semi-illiterate.
- Every word can be written using the syllabries if you don't know the kanji.
- The syllabries are completely phonetic, save for a few well-recognizable exceptions.
- Kanji solve the problem of homophones. In English, words that sound the same are written using different letters, resulting in the ortography not being phonetic anymore. When I read an English word unknown to me, I can often think of many different ways to pronounce it. When I hear one, I'm not always sure how to write it. In Japanese, I can at least make out with which kana it would be written, and with that knowledge also look up the kanji for it if I wish. (I'd say that Spanish and Italian are superior to both in this respect, though)
- The Japs mostly took fairly simple hanzi and/or simplified them. This makes it often much shorter to write one kanji instead of up to four kana, or 8 Latin letters.
- The meaning of a kanji can still be guessed from its appearance.
- Due to kana and the use of romaji, it's not that hard to write Japanese on a computer.
In short, I like that they basically took all the pros of using a syllabry and the Chinese system while remedying many of their respective shortcomings.
(Also, I'm not claiming to be an expert with any of this shit, so nobody rage if I got something wrong)