I’ve never been to China, so I have a lot to learn.

Of the world’s seven main continents, I’ve only visited or lived in three of them – North America, Europe, and Africa (plus little Zealandia, which isn’t usually counted among the big seven). I’ve never stepped foot in any of the 48 countries in Asia, which, of course, includes the vast, ancient, proud country of China. I’ve read about China, though; and, thanks to Pearl S. Buck’s novels, most of which I’ve read over the years, I feel as if I’ve been there. 

Nevertheless, the realities of today’s China remain shrouded in mystery to me. The biggest mystery at the moment is that China seems to be interested in me.

Let me explain:

Lately, as I’ve mentioned in a recent WOW post, I’ve been seeing an enormous number of “views” ostensibly from China in my blog’s statistics, which I check daily. Here’s a recent example:

Although I’ve never been a numbers person, I find it fascinating to see where (to say nothing of whether) my blogposts are being read. I love knowing my words have a broad, if not numerically impressive, reach, because I care about this whole, swirling world and the fate of the estimated 8.2+ billion people in it.

It’s statistically possible, I guess, that of China’s population of about 1.42 billion people, a thousand or so of them on any given day might be interested in reading what I have to say about my small life as a single, retired American woman living in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Could my views, ruminations, meditations, or observations be of any value to Chinese people these days? Possibly — but highly unlikely, I’d say.

So who are these Chinese “viewers”? And why are they “reading” my WOWs? 

I tried to ask my blog’s administrators in Taos (where WOW was born eleven years and 552 posts ago), and I was met with something of a shrug. Why should I care?, they wanted to know. Numbers are good; the more, the better! And there’s nothing they could do about China anyway. 

But of course I wasn’t satisfied. I still wanted to know.

So I turned to “Professor” Google and learned I’m not alone in this quandary. Other bloggers (some more numbers for you: there are well over 31 million bloggers in the U.S. alone) complained about the same phenomenon. Some of these complainants suggested blocking China. My administrators said this isn’t possible.

So my questions remain unanswered and the mystery unsolved.

I’d love for my Chinese “viewers” to identify themselves. Leave a comment or two! Answer me: Who are you?

Are you even human? I fear not. I write for human beings who have hearts as well as minds. Do you have both?  If you are bots, what are you getting, extracting from my blogposts? What are you looking for? What, exactly, do you want? What are you doing in my WOW world?

I feel as if I’m shouting into the wind, alone on a mountaintop. And, to extrapolate: This seems to be the human condition these days. Computer technology — as my miniscule example may illustrate — is not-so-slowly and very surely invading our lives, sucking up our information like juice through a straw, and leaving us feeling vulnerable, manipulated, used. 

Nothing against China. I’m sorry I’ll never get to go there and see it for myself, in person, in this lifetime. But I must say China’s computer prowess is clearly formidable – and to this speck-of-dust human – frightening.