What are the motifs in The Great Railway Bazaar: By Train Through Asia by Paul Theroux?

Learning about different culttures is a motif in the book. While meeting people, the author learns about the cultures of the nations through which he passes. Some of things he finds out are obvious; others are more subtle. The train travels in Western and Eastern Europe has inferior service and no dining car, as if this means of travel is now considered obsolete. Train travel is excellent in Turkey and Iran, though the author is somewhat shocked as he leaves secular Turkey, and more and more women wear veils. In Pakistan and Iran, many women are veiled and men engage in a weird sort of staring at women on billboards and in strip clubs.