I have learnt Chinese and use it for work. Chinese characters have a personality of their own, you don't need to know the sound to remember them. You could even

I have learnt Chinese and use it for work. Chinese characters have a personality of their own, you don't need to know the sound to remember them. You could even read perfectly Chinese and being unable to communicate orally. This very hard to understand or even believe when not experienced for real. So yes, learning Chinese or Kanji has a steeper learning curve, but no, it is not that hard, and in fact from context and shape you can guess a possible pronunciation and meaning for unknown characters, sometime.