From the terror of the Taliban to the tailcoats of Eton

Is any school as imposing as Eton? The Olympic rowing lake, the 15th-century chapel… even the tailcoats seem calculated to overwhelm. Yet Rohid Zamani was not awestruck by the Gothic architecture, but by his room for the night.

"It was enormous, much bigger than my room at home," says Rohid. "It was looking out over School Yard, the bed was comfy and it even had its own bathroom." Best of all, he confides, it was warm.

Heat is a luxury for the 16-year-old, whose tiny room in the cramped 1960s prefab in Hull he shares with his parents, sister and two brothers is barely big enough for a bed and a wardrobe. His school laptop is the sole extravagance. The Liverpool fan goes to sleep each night looking at old Manchester United wallpaper that his parents cannot afford to replace.

Earlier this month, Rohid learnt he would be swapping his council house for the alma mater of 19 British prime ministers. He starts at Eton in September, one of just eight sixth-formers on a scholarship that will cover the pounds 32,000-a-year fees.

But Rohid is perfectly happy with his bedroom at home. In fact, don't expect him to admit to having endured a difficult childhood. If ever anything irks him, Rohid can simply recall his former life in Afghanistan and the irritation becomes trifling.

Sitting in his blazer and tie in a bright classroom in Hull's Sirius Academy, he winces as he recalls the tyranny of the Taliban. Even though he was only three when his parents fled the regime, his memories of his days in Kabul are vivid.

One day, as a toddler, he was playing on the floor with a little red car, his only toy. "My mum was really ill in bed, and my aunt came to visit and said to her: 'You should get up and clear your head,'?" Rohid recalls. "Just as she got up, a bomb went off outside the house. I still remember hearing the glass shatter and the shards dropping on the bed. My mum would have died if she hadn't got up."

It was not an isolated event. Rohid's parents once saw Islamic extremists decapitate a man for wearing hair gel. "My whole family were afraid for their lives every day," he says.

The Zamanis began saving up to leave, and finally fled in 2000. When they reached Britain, Rohid's father - a well-respected engineer in Afghanistan - found work as a van driver, first in Hull, then Birmingham.

But at the age of 10, Rohid became disillusioned with his school, and called his old headmaster in Hull to ask if he could return. He convened a family meeting and persuaded his reluctant sister that the family should move back.

Six years later, the offer from Eton seems the strongest vindication of their decision.

At Sirius, a sports teacher persuaded Rohid to apply for the public school scholarship. His response was: "Are you sure I'm smart enough?" His parents also needed to be won round. "I said: 'This is the school that Prince Harry and Prince William went to,'?" he grins. Soon, the whole family was in the car on a 12-hour round trip to Berkshire, Rohid doing his nine-year-old brother's maths homework on the journey.

Four days of intensive tests and interviews followed, but Rohid wanted to celebrate getting beyond the gates, even if only for assessment. "I thought: 'I'm here and I might never get the chance again.' There were a couple of debating clubs but I didn't really fancy that. I asked about sports clubs and saw they had kickboxing." For a couple of hours, the Afghani kid from Hull kicked and punched 18 Etonians. "I could probably have taken a couple of them," says Rohid, who trains for 12 hours a week in mixed martial arts, and plans to set up Eton's first boxing club when he arrives.

He wants to be a surgeon, and intends to study medicine at Cambridge, but Rohid wants eventually to return to Hull. "It would be great to work in a hospital here and come back to my roots," he says. "I would like to make something of myself and provide for my parents, and for the community."

It is his way of thanking his neighbours for their help. "We had to come to England to escape the war but everyone here was so welcoming. People in Afghanistan were dying every day, and I could have been just one of those numbers that you see in the paper, another casualty."

For now, Eton awaits. Isn't he nervous? "I thought it would be daunting at first, but if you think about it, they are just people, like you. If you're as smart as them and on the same level physically, you have just as much chance. And just as much right to be there."