[DonaldFisk]

> it's not like English doesn't have crazy non-phonetic spellings as well (how tf is "through" supposed to be pronounced for a English learner?)

English is probably the worst case among alphabetic languages, but you can still usually guess the exact pronunciation of an unfamiliar word.

> the Chinese language consists of MANY homophones.

But still Chinese speakers make themselves understood without difficulty, even over the telephone. Most Chinese words are polysyllabic. Taking that into account, homophones are rarer than you might think.

There's a language+, Dungan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungan_language), which is to some extent mutually intelligible with Mandarin. It's written entirely in the Cyrillic alphabet without diacritics to indicate tone. Sample text: http://www.omniglot.com/babel/dungan.htm

+ You could call it a dialect, but it has its own script.