system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: How do people who speak Asian languages such as Chinese or Japanese explain how to spell words?

In Western languages we have letters that build into words, however in most Asian dialects there doesn't seem to be letters. So if someone from China didn't know how to spell a word, how would his friend explain how to spell that word or symbol?
gpt
Aside from kanji, the the japanese written language (hiragana & katakana) is phonetic just like the western alphabet.  In fact, it's even more phonetic then English, considering that many English words aren't pronounced via their letters, but historical roots of the word.