this is bbc news, the headlines: china is seeing a sharp increase of positive covid cases, just 10 days after suddenly easing its strict lockdown measures following a wave of protests, with the capital beijing being one of the worst affected areas. in shanghai, officials have ordered most schools to take classes online. the award—winning iranian film actress, taraneh alidoosti, has been arrested after publicly condemning the first execution of a protester in iran earlier this month. an iranian news agency says ms alidoosti, was detained for publishing what it called false and distorted content and inciting chaos. leo varadkar has become prime minister of ireland,

returning to the top job as part of a power sharing deal between the country's two leading parties. he's taking over from micheal martin. the pact brought together the two rival parties that have historically dominated irish politics now on bbc news, the travel show. this week on the show — a centenary fit for a pharaoh. this is very exciting, because i've been given permission to actually go down these steps to ground level and get a closer look. the christmas tradition that will scare the stockings off you. and why glaswegian panto crowds are not to be messed with. if the act on that stage was not good enough, believe me, they knew about it.

egypt's valley of the kings — perhaps the most famous archaeological site in the world, and this has been a landmark year at the burial chamber many people make a beeline for. exactly 100 years ago, the tomb of the boy king tutankhamun was discovered underneath the desert close to the town of luxor. the team had been digging for years and were right on the verge of giving up when the top of a set of ancient steps appeared in the sand and, lo and behold,

this is what they saw. i mean, look at it — incredible, absolutely astonishing. and when the archaeologists did come here, they didn'tjust find his remains. they found ornaments, jewellery, paintings, bits of chariots, trumpets, perfume, and even wine. tutankhamun wasn't the most influential or best known of the pharaohs, and his tomb isn't the biggest or the most spectacular, but the find was a sensation in 1922 and made headlines around the world. now, then, this is very exciting, because i've been given permission to actually go down these steps to ground level and get a closer look.

this mural is incredible. it actually depicts the afterlife of tutankhamun. it's incredible that it's all so well preserved. it looks astonishing. i'm not going to touch it, but wow. for this corner of egypt, the discovery meant more treasure in the form of tourism and the sales opportunities that came with it. mo salah, the liverpool football player. thank you. a century on and souvenirs in his image still bring in the money. thank you very much. greece? greece — no, from london. you have tutankhamun here, so much tutankhamun.

it has been a landmark year for egypt's antiquities, with new and restored discoveries opening and a huge, glittering parade as the mummies of 22 pharaohs were moved to their new home — the national museum of egyptian civilisation. also newly opened after restoration work is the home of the man widely credited with finding tutankhamun�*s burial chamber, howard carter. however, many say the egyptian contribution to all this has been overlooked, and i'm on my way to hear some of that story and meet a family very

well known in these parts, although sadly not outside this country. it's interesting with the two sides of the nile. i've just come from the east side, which is where there's all the shops, and life bustles on and people live there and stuff. but i'm heading now back to the emptier, less developed west side, where you'll find the tombs and burial chambers of the valley of the kings, and they call that the side of the dead. the abdel rassoul family run a cafe these days. but generations of them farmed along the banks of the nile, and as such have an intimate knowledge of what lies on — and underneath — the dust and sand. so this is the 12—year—old boy that they said really discovered the tomb. he claims it was actually his father who first found the tomb of tutankhamun.

ahmed abdel rasoul was just a child at the time. now, egyptian perspectives like these are being acknowledged more widely,

and one of the ways that's happening is by huge landmark public projects like the brand—new grant egyptian museum, due to open in 2023. it'll be the largest archaeological museum complex in the world. and this, too — the avenue of the sphinx, buried under sand for hundreds of years and last year opened to the public for the first time. it runs from luxor temple to karnak, this magnificent complex. what do you think about the fact that it is so crowded? it is so crowded. it's extremely crowded. i have to tell you, this is the busiest it could have got in ancient egypt, because the people who were ordinary were not allowed here. this is an exclusive area. it's only for the priests, only for the members of the royal court, only for the select few. people like ourselves would have never had any

glimpse of the inside of the temple. she is an amazing storyteller, and i ask her about the story of the abdel rassouls and who really discovered the tomb. she believes there is a wider issue. i think to focus on this is to miss the point. the whole point is the contribution of the whole abdel rassoul family and the many egyptian families who were involved in the archaeological excavations, without whom howard and many of the foreign excavators could not have made any of these discoveries altogether. and this is kind of connected to how egyptians are portrayed in this world of archaeology. we are not even portrayed, we are totally written out. we are written out from the whole process of knowledge production. whenever it's an egyptian, he would have stumbled on a step, as you said, or been stumbling riding a donkey etc. it could never be out of real knowledge, it has to be a mistake. while the egyptians clearly played a huge part in the discovery, the

persistence of howard carter and the money of his wealthy, aristocratic backer were also vitally important to the success. now, the desire is for both parts of that story to be recognised and told. all these tourists here, all the people who are here, what do you think they believe? do you think they still believe the old version, or do you think they are gradually being told something which is more in tune with what you think? no, i think they carry the same old beliefs. because all of their programmes would only focus on ancient egypt, nothing on the many other layers of egyptian heritage. that's one thing, and the other thing is that the whole — what brought them in here is this colonial narrative. it's the narrative that we need to reshape. are you at least hopeful in the future that might change, that small children across the world will get a better understanding of all of this? yes, i hope so. this can only come when acknowledging the colonial history that made ancient egypt the way it is in egypt today. we need to acknowledge

this first and then move on from there. for the rest of his life, ahmed abdel rassoul told visitors to luxor about his adventures with howard carter — an account, like so many others, rarely told in the west. but what's good is that the egyptians are now reclaiming their story, and the rest of us are beginning to take notice. well away from the big archaeological sites, there are a whole bundle of things to do in egypt, and here are some of the highlights. for beach breaks, the red sea coast has got a string of well—developed resort towns that have been popular for years. sharm el—sheikh is probably the best known, especially after recently hosting the cop climate talks.

for something quieter, though, you could try makadi bay — long, white, sandy beaches, without the crowds and clubs. the whole stretch of coastline has crystal—clear seas and thriving coral reefs, so divers love it. turtles, spinner dolphins, manta rays and dugongs are the big stars here. one of the other highlights is the sunken british cargo steamship ss thistlegorm. it was sunk by german bombers in 19111. 200 divers a day now explore the wreck near the town of ras muhammad. the holy month of ramadan begins in march next year. during the day it might mean shorter opening hours and disrupted transport. however, iftar, the breaking of the fast at sunset, means loads happening in the evenings. hotels will lay on entertainment, but the real celebrations are around the neighbourhood iftar tables, made out on the street. you'll need a local

to invite you, but this is where party is. still to come on the travel show: the other christmas visitor that could come knocking this december, and this one's not quite so jolly. and the glasgow theatre tradition you need nerves of steel to take part in. you have men in the back of the auditorium throwing shipyard rivets, nails, punches, screws. so don't go away. this week i'm exploring some of egypt's most famous antiquities, and i thought it might be worth lingering a little at karnak temple. at its peak, around 3,000 to 4,000 years ago, this was the largest and most important religious complex in ancient egypt, and the description of some of the detail here has me hooked. you were talking about obelisks. yes.

and that is a very, very tall one. and this takes us to the god ra, the god of the sun, one of the most important gods. and that is how you see that pyramid shape at the end of the obelisks. that's your way to the sky, where you get tojoin god ra up in the sky and come back again. just the sheer feat of creating that high a structure. yes, of course. and then doing all the engravings on the side. is that appreciated enough? i don't think it is. we tend to appreciate the beauty but not the labour, not the hard work that went into bringing something like this not only up, but the carving, the making, the carving of the actual stone to take the shape of an obelisk, and then moving it all the way to here. so it came from down the river, right. and what about this little step here? yes, it is like the strong bull, discussing how the king has huge great physical features, that he is equated

to the bull, as strong as a bull. this was also one of the most important things that any ancient egyptian king would have acquired. the complex opens from 6:00 in the morning. and now mass tourism is back with us once again, it is worth attempting to avoid the crowds — and the heat — by arriving early. to tirol in austria next, which is right in the middle of a busy christmas run—up. and in that part of the world, santa claus isn't the only one who comes knocking. krampus is part goat, and part devil, and hisjob is to punish naughty children. masks of his face are made by craftspeople, like norbert.

krampus is an ancient pagan character, but when christianity spread throughout europe, he became part of the christmas tradition — despite opposition from the catholic church.

now, with the festive season well under way, there's one british pastime that keeps the lights burning during those long winter nights — and that is the christmas panto. cat moh has more. we're in glasgow, where scotland's premium pantomime dame is treading the boards in her 25th panto season. growling. oh, just quit that moaning, will you? it's basically a good night out, which is the most important thing — or a good afternoon out — full of laughs and joy, sort of hitched on to a traditional fairytale love story. it's usually kids' first experience of theatre, so we are the sort of gateway, if you like. there's hundreds of years of tradition in panto,

from audience participation... those folks will believe everything, i tell you. oh, yes, they will! oh, no, they won't! 0h, oh, yes they will! ..to a host of stock characters. the panto dame is generally a man dressed as a woman, and that allowed men to come out and do really outrageous impersonations of women. it's quite unusual to be a woman playing it. i'm one of very few allowed to. maybe in the past, women have been forced into being the more glamorous type, and my thing is it's not about whether you're a man or a woman, it is the type of performer you are. if you can break through to the audience, and say, "i'm about to make a fool of myself here. "come with me." couldn't find a petrol station. we ended up wandering through this barren, desolate wasteland. where was that? i think it was paisley.

laughter. it's a great quote by a wonderful panto performer, gerry kelly, who i worked here with many times, "pantomime is "a celebration of local culture". we have set this on clydeside, which is obviously in glasgow, but making it local, having all the references in itand making it of the place that generally the audience are from. it is a big business across the uk. pre—pandemic theatres sold around 3 million panto tickets a year, and glasgow has a special affection for it. among the dozens of venues staging a production is this wee treasure, hidden above an amusement arcade. you are in the britannia panopticon music hall, it's the oldest original surviving music hall

in the world. music halls are basically places where the working classes used to go when they finished their working day, to be entertained by dancers, singers, novelty acts, contortionists, high—wire acts — you name it. you know, music halls were one of the places where you would see a pantomime. pantomime was the only sort of theatre that was like variety all in the one production. glasgow has a long—standing theatre tradition. a recent poll found it was one of the british cities with the most theatres outside london. and back when the panopticon opened in the 1850s, working class glaswegian theatres were already developing a bit of a reputation. stanley baxter actually wrote about the music hall in his own bedside book, and he actually said that they "left no turn unstoned." they had spent money to get in here. if the act on that stage was not good enough, believe me, they knew about it. boys used to urinate from the front of the balcony onto the stage to hit

the act on the stage below, you had men in the back of the auditorium throwing shipyard rivets, nails, punches, screws. it became popular with famous acts because if they could get away with it on the stages in glasgow, they could get away with their routine anywhere in the world. luckily, things have quietened down a bit since then, but glasgow audiences are still a famously lively bunch. for me, if i was going to go and see panto, i would come here, because of the audience. in glasgow, there is a great tradition of audiences joining in — sometimes whether you want it or not! laughter. i do question myself, "why am i keep doing it? "i'm a granny, i'm 64! "why would you go out?" so, for me, it allows me to walk in the light and push the light out. it gives people a good night out. it's a great leveller, as well, because you've got

people who work for the government and you've got people who are cleaners. they're all experiencing the same thing, and there are so few places we can go now where 2,000 people can gather. so to be part of that still, after all these years, makes it all worth it. cheering and applause. right, sadly, that's us done here in luxor. butjoin me next week, when we look back at the best bits of 2022 on the travel show — a year when we can finally say we hit the road again. and what a year it's been. if you want another chance to see ade on a roll with some italian cheese, carmen's human—powered odyssey along the human—powered network, or even my very special night in the home of a boyhood

hero, do give us a watch in a week's time. hello there. part two of this weekend brings a change to our weather. we're finally going to see an end to this extremely cold spell of weather. milder, wetter, windier weather will be spreading out from the south but before it does so, we're likely to see a risk of ice and snow for a while, and the ice could be bad enough across northern parts of england, particularly the pennines, through sunday. the met office have issued an amber ice warning for it. so, it looks like we could see some disruption as rain and sleet falls on these frozen surfaces. could be very slippery indeed across some roads and pavements

and, like i mentioned, there is that chance of transient snow. as this area of low pressure, these weather fronts, push their way northwards. now, it will be turning milder across southern and western areas quite quickly through the day. however, this mild air will take a while to push the colder air out of the way because we start off on a very cold note across central and northern and eastern areas on sunday. the wind and rain already across the south and the west will push into that cold air — this is where we are likely to see some transient snow on the leading edge, certainly over the hills — and that significant risk of ice, that amber warning in force there. it's going to be a very cold day for many, particularly when you factor in the strong southerly wind, but it will be turning mild by the end. of the day across the far south—west. that mild, wet, windy weather spreads northwards across all areas during sunday night and the ice and snow risk diminish so by monday, it's going to feel very different, very mild indeed compared to we're been used to. a windy day to come, rather grey, cloudy. outbreaks of pretty heavy rain across southern and western areas.

the chances of localised flooding in places where we have snow and ice melt and also, the rain falling on the surfaces as well. but look at those temperatures — up to the mid teens celsius for many of us. stays blustery with further rain as we move out of monday into tuesday. low pressure sitting to the north and the west of the country. however, could see something just a little bit fresher pushing into the northern half of the country, as indicated there by the blue hue. i think it's still quite a mild day though across southern and eastern areas. outbreaks of rain clipping the south—east. some sunny spells around. blustery showers affecting the north—west of the uk, maybe something a little bit wintry over the higher ground. single figure values here, otherwise we're at or above the seasonal norm for northern ireland, for much of england and wales. stays unsettled, though, around the middle parts of the week. this is wednesday's area of low pressure. this is thursday's area of low pressure, so we will continue to see bouts of wind and rain at times. on wednesday, i think it's the northern half of the country that will see the windiest and the wettest weather. further south, a few showers but also some sunshine. it will stay blustery. again, pretty mild for the time of year in the south. something a little bit

fresher further north. on thursday, it could be a reverse — it could be the southern half of the country that's impacted by this next area of low pressure. could see some heavy rain again across southern and western areas — a risk of flooding here. there's just the chance some colder air could return across scotland, so here, the rain will turn to snow, it maybe even down to lower levels. at the moment it looks like it's going to be on the hills. and you can see it's chilly there whereas further south, again, particularly southern areas, we're into double figures. and as we head into the christmas period, it looks like it stays unsettled. further spells of wet and windy weather and there's a question mark to how far southwards this bluer, this colder air will move southwards because there is a chance northern parts could see the colder air and have some periods of snow, particularly over the higher ground. but there is still a question mark on that — you have to stay tuned to the forecast. indications here on the icons, you can see it will turn colder across the north of the uk around the christmas period whereas further south, it stays unsettled but i think we're staying with temperatures around or a little above the seasonal norm.

hello and welcome to bbc news. i'm rich preston. china is seeing a sharp rise in positive covid cases, just 10 days after suddenly easing its strict lockdown measures following a wave of protests, with the capital beijing being one of the worst affected areas. in china's largest city, shanghai, officials have ordered most of its schools to take classes online. 0ur reporter, ijoema ndukwe reports. cars bearing the dead line the driveway of this crematorium assigned for covid—19 deaths. it is among dozens of such facilities