Volunteer recruitment for the Shanghai World Expo kicked off on May 1, 2009, exactly one year before the Expo was slated to open. On April 17, 2010, the selected volunteers were sworn in; this was just the first step of what would be a major task for these volunteers. During the 184 days of the Expo, the number of volunteers will reach about 680,000; this greatly exceeds the 76,000 volunteers that were present at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Ma Chunlei, the director of the Expo's Volunteer Department, said that it is a huge challenge to manage so many volunteers for such a long event.

Xia Kejia, the leader of the volunteers at the Expo Park, said that the volunteer work has gotten easier since the opening of this event. At the beginning, some visitors complained that in some areas of the Expo Park the number of volunteers was not enough to meet the demands of the visitors. They also said some volunteers were not familiar enough with the Park. Organizers shifted the positions of some of the volunteers and improved their training regimen accordingly.

The Volunteer Department is not alone in trying to improve volunteers' performance. Volunteers from Fudan University, the first group of volunteers to work at the Expo Park, left 13 manuals for later volunteers. The manuals cover almost everything that a prospective volunteer might need to know. "The purpose of the manuals is to help later volunteers to adapt to the work as quickly as possible," said Gao Tian, Deputy Secretary of the Communist Youth League of Fudan University.

A volunteer group from Tongji University designed an array of volunteer incentives including colorful bracelets and Expo Service Star badges to encourage volunteers. There are Star of the Day, Star of the Week and Star of the Month awards for those volunteers who distinguish themselves through hard work and dedication.

According to data released by the Shanghai World Expo Coordination Bureau, more than 80 percent of the volunteers at the Expo were born in the 1980s and 1990s.

Nicknamed Little Bok Choys or Smurfs, the volunteers stand under the blazing sun for hours, greeting every single guest who strolls through the Expo gates. Sometimes the volunteers will answer the same question several times in one minute. However, volunteers never tire of this routine. Instead, they keep smiling and happily offer assistance.

These young volunteers have a few things on their list they'd like to see at the Expo. "We're very familiar with everything at the Expo Park except for the interiors of the pavilions, as we've never entered any pavilion to pay a visit," said Qin Qiuyan, a volunteer from Shanghai Normal University. "I hope that one day I can go in the pavilions to see what's inside." This is a common wish for all the volunteers at the Expo.