TICKETS IN HAND: A Shanghai citizen buys tickets from a China Telecom outlet on July 1, 2009 (LIU YING)

Dong Aizhen, a senior citizen living in Pudong of Shanghai, stood in front of a post office at 5:30 a.m. on July 1, the first day tickets for the 2010 World Expo were sold to individuals.

"I don't want to stand in long queues," Dong told Xinhua News Agency. She said she lives next to the Expo site and bought five tickets for her whole family.

More than 40,000 individual tickets for the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai had been sold as of 5:30 p.m. on July 1, event organizers said.

A total of 2,796 outlets of China Mobile, China Telecom, Bank of Communications and China Post around China will sell tickets to customers. People can also buy tickets online or over the phone. Foreigners can buy tickets from agents in their countries starting this month.

There are no long queues for the tickets as the six-month-long event is 10 months away, Qian Chenhui, a manager at the Bank of Communications Shanghai branch, told Xinhua. Buyers don't have to bring their ID cards as there is no limit on how many tickets one person can buy at one time.

The event, with the theme "Better City, Better Life," will last from May 1 to October 31 next year and is expected to attract 70 million visitors, the organizer said.

Blue tickets for the fair's opening and closing and special dates—May 1 to 3, October 1-7 (the National Day holiday) and October 25-31—cost 200 yuan ($29.4). Yellow tickets for other fair days cost 160 yuan ($23.5).

Tickets went on presale to group buyers of at least 30 tickets on March 27. So far, about 3 million group tickets have been sold.

The event in Shanghai will be the largest Expo in terms of the number of participants. According to Xinhua, 191 countries and 48 international organizations had confirmed their participation as of July 1. The total number of 239 participants is 67 more than the record 172 at the 2000 Expo in Hanover, Germany.

The United States, which has been slow to raise money for its pavilion, will take part in the 2010 World Expo too, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton confirmed in Washington on July 1.