Learning Japanese

It may have shown either from my spelling, grammar and especially from my name that I am not an English native. I speak French as a mother language, and I can read some Spanish (I had 4 years of classes on it in high school). However these languages all use the Latin alphabet with some variations, French and Spanish being romance languages and English being a germanic language.

I decided to learn Japanese, a long and hard journey it seems. The japanese language is written using two distinct syllabaries (Hiragana and Katakana) and Kanjis (imported chineese caracters from the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD)). Until now I know the Hiragana syllabary and I am progressing with the Katananas. Both have 46 distinct symbols, mapping to syllables. Kanjis are much more of a long shot though with their 1945 official minimum symbols. According to a site, the actual upper limit to these is more around 50 000, while a working knowledge of them would be around a few thousands.