ELI5, The Japanese Writing System
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The short version is:
You got kanji (漢字), which are “appropriated” chinese characters. They are used for your content words (nouns, verb-roots, adjectives).
You got hiragana (へらがな), where each character corresponds to a syllable, mostly for grammatical bits (verb-endings and particles), sometimes words are spelled out in hiragana.
Then you have katakana (カタカナ), which make the same sounds (ish) as hiragana, but are mostly used for foreign words, especially names.
Mix all three together and you got your self a sentence.
ラーメンが好き
Has katakana: ラーメン – Ra Me N
Kanji: 好
and hiragana: が (particle), き (verb ending)
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