If he’s lucky I might even allow him to play with it one

If he’s lucky, I might even allow him to play with it, one day. Driven by a mix of nostalgia, disposable income and a soaring market for collectables, the hobby has become popular as never before.It is a telling fact that only 20 per cent of model trains are bought by children these days. The railway boomers are men of a certain age, but unlike previous generations who tended to be pipe-smoking, cocoa-drinking and shod in carpet slippers, today’s man in the model shop is just as likely to be dressed in a Paul Smith suit and to work in the media (Pete Waterman, Mick Jagger and Peter Snow all have their own train sets).It’s a shame that no one has classified the railway modeller in the same meticulous way that he classifies his own trains but some statistics tell the story. The combined readership of the two leading model railway magazines is about 350,000; there are about 700 model railway clubs across Britain, and on any weekend there are between 20 and 30 exhibitions.”There is no such thing as a typical modeller,” says John Brewer, the editor of Railway Modeller magazine.

“Only some are interested in the trains; others are more interested in the control systems, which have become far more sophisticated. Others get involved purely in the craft side – making the buildings and scenery.”And of course, there’s the money. A world record price for a model locomotive of £105,000 was set at auction recently, and a canny buy could easily outpace that case of Grand Cru claret. A “mint and boxed” locomotive made from one of the old Hornby die-cast moulds, before the company went over to plastic, can fetch £1,000 – about 50 times the price of 15 years ago.But what of the man in his shed or attic, running trains in circles? Is he the candidate for the psychotherapist that we often suspect he might be? Mr Brewer laughs: “You only need to watch the guys running the layouts at any model railway exhibition.

If they’re control freaks, all I can say is that they’re not very good at it!”. Last March, soon after I had been kicked out of Kabul by the Taliban, I met an old Afghan friend who was visiting Pakistan. He is an archaeologist, his speciality being the Afghan Buddhist era. His life was in danger; he had a chance to seek asylum in Canada but was hesitating “You must go,” I urged him “It’s too dangerous for you in Kabul Don’t worry, it won’t be forever, you’ll be back. The Taliban will be gone by the end of the year.”He laughed with delight at the outrageousness of the idea But that is what I thought in March. The Taliban’s destruction of the Buddhas was a deeply symbolic act by a group that wanted to annihilate large chunks of the nation’s history There was opposition from all areas and ethnic groups. “Afghanistan can shake off the Taliban tomorrow,” I said to my friend Joyenda.The country has felt volatile, bubbling, ripe for change for months.

I’m not convinced the military campaign was necessary, but in the end that’s how the Taliban were defeated. I was just glad I was able to walk into Kabul ahead of the Alliance troops. The crowds on the outskirts were rapturous, smiling and laughing They shook my hand and said zindabad! (meaning long life). A weight, a dreary totalitarian deadness, has been lifted off this city.People keep saying, “I’m free, I can choose for myself – what haircut, what clothes, what entertainment.” The Afghan generosity is reasserting itself. Kabul is refinding its identity after being buried alive for five years “For today I’m happy,” said one friend “I don’t care about the future.”But anxiety is setting in. The new masters of Kabul are just one group from the Northern Alliance. The ethnic Tajik faction, Jamiat-i Islami, their partners, are furious, saying the Alliance broke a promise not to enter the capital.