This week's UK news: 23 October 2015
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23 October 2015


Problems for Halloween

The last day of October is the festival of Halloween. It is a traditional festival, but has become much more popular in the last 20 years since the UK adopted the US customs of trick or treating and wearing special costumes.

But there is a problem with this year's festival. People like to make special lights by carving faces or patterns in pumpkins (which are large round orange vegetables) and putting candles inside. But this year, pumpkin numbers are down by about half because it rained very heavily at the end of the summer which made many of the pumpkins rot.  

 

Drama in the Rugby World Cup

England is the host nation for the 2015 Rugby World Cup. But England got knocked out of the tournament before the quarter final stages. That left three UK nations - Ireland, Scotland and Wales - still playing. But all three teams got knocked out last weekend. 

The semi-final games are being played this weekend, with Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina all trying to get into the final match next weekend. 

 

Lots of excitement about music and films

Adele is one of the UK's biggest-selling musicians. Her first two albums, 18 and 21, won lots of awards and sold millions of copies worldwide. 21 sold 30 million copies all over the world. 

However, Adele has not released any new music for three years, when she sang the theme tune to the James Bond film Skyfall. This week she has released a new single, called Hello, and announced that her new album, 25, will be out on November 20.

The new James Bond film, Spectre, opens in UK cinemas on Monday. And cinemas have now let people book tickets for the new Star Wars film which opens in the UK in December. So many people have been trying to buy tickets that cinema websites have crashed. 

 

Chinese president visits UK

Xi Jinping, the Chinese President, has been on a four-day official visit to the UK. During his time here, he was the guest at an official banquet at Buckingham Palace hosted by the Queen, with politicians and members of the Royal Family. He also went to a pub with the Prime Minister and drank a pint of beer and ate fish and chips. 

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