Ma Jieqiang (left) with the 3D map of the Expo Garden he designed for sight-impaired visitors.

Tour guide spent one year crafting aerial view of the Expo Garden, Wu Yiyao reports.

Ma Jieqiang leads his sight-impaired ward through the Life & Sunshine Pavilion. He then places the man's hand on its 3D map, which Ma designed to show a bird's-eye layout of the Expo Garden.

"Now we are at the Seed Cathedral," said the 57-year-old, who works for Shanghai Travel Agency. The other man felt the pavilion's contours with his fingers and nodded in agreement. "It's spectacular," he said.

The 3D map, which took Ma one year to design and another two months to craft, is working wonders by giving people with visual impairments access to something they would otherwise have to do without: a tangible sense of the layout of the Expo.

Ma, who has worked in the tourism industry for over two decades, has made friends with many of the people he has been charged with caring for within the Expo Garden, he said.

He guides them through the pavilions, letting them touch those exhibits where it is permissible to do so, so they can feel, and mind map, the wooden carvings, water paintings and other things on offer.

"Traveling is really inconvenient for these people," said Ma. "But they deserve to enjoy the same experience as people with 20/20 vision."

Ma said he was touched when many of his new friends said they wanted to visit the Expo in the lead-up to its opening in May.

"I promised that I would guide them around. So I take them first to have a look at my 3D map, and thereby fulfill the promise that I made."

Ma made three volumes full of newspaper clippings so he could explain the background of certain countries and what they offer at the Expo, he said.

He used many different materials when building the map, including silk to authentically replicate the faade of the Japan Pavilion, which looks like a purple silkworm.

To imitate the solar-powered ceiling of the China Pavilion, Ma applied a reflective board to the top of his model. He even tore the bristles from hundreds of toothbrushes to build a miniature of the UK Pavilion, known for its 60,000 see-bearing acrylic rods.

The tour guide worked at night, in his spare time. He spent over 60 summer evenings sorting out the materials and assembling them to fit the pavilions.

"The Shanghai Expo's theme of 'Better City, Better Life' is not just empty talk," he said. "The idea of enjoying a better life applies just as much to people who can't see as to those who can."