Podcast
Smokers still puffing away at Expo 2010
Updated: 2010-08-16 13:36
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Despite organizers repeatedly appealing to smokers to allow Expo 2010 Shanghai to be a smoke-free event, smokers are in no mood to cooperate.
While some smokers endeavored to accede to the request, many claimed it has been difficult to find the designated smoking areas scattered around the 5.28-sq-km Expo Garden.
"There are no clear signs to direct me to the right places," said Zhang Lu, a visitor from Jiangsu province. "It is tough for people to walk a long way to find smoking areas, especially under the sizzling sun in such hot weather."
Some smokers also suggested that Expo organizers increase and enlarge the designated smoking areas at Expo Garden.
"It took me nearly half an hour to find a smoking area," said Wang Changliang, a visitor from Beijing. "It is a nightmare for heavy smokers."
There are 43 designated smoking areas at Expo Garden, most of them situated next to the toilets.
For most smokers, however, shelters and benches by popular pavilions with water jets nearby are the ideal locations to rest and have a cigarette.
As it is not permitted for lighters to be brought into Expo Garden, smokers have resorted to a variety of methods to light their cigarettes, with the Shanghai Morning Post reporting that one desperate smoker even used reading glasses in an effort to harness solar power.
The most popular method used by smokers seems to be hiding lighters in bags and looking for a loophole in security while they enter the site. In some cases, matches and matchboxes were separately taken into Expo Garden.
To encourage smokers to respect smoke-free zones, Expo organizers improved the designated smoking areas by providing them with benches and more shelter from the sun.
Maintenance personnel were also assigned to patrol the designated smoking zones to ensure all facilities, including non-portable lighters, were in good working order.
In an effort to crack down on smokers using smoke-free areas, organizers arranged for over 300 volunteers to patrol the Expo Garden since the end of July, attempting to dissuade smokers from lighting up outside designated smoking areas.
（中國日報網(wǎng)英語點津 Helen 編輯）
About the broadcaster:
Nelly Min is an editor at China Daily with more than 10 years of experience as a newspaper editor and photographer. She has worked at major newspapers in the U.S., including the Los Angeles Times and the Detroit Free Press. She is fluent in Korean and has a 2-year-old son.