When I lived in Japan in the late 1960s, our toilet was a Toto (common in the US now, but back then it was a Japan-only brand), and as is common in Japanese homes, there was a pair of red slippers that were only worn while using the toilet. I would from time to time close my eyes, click the slippers three times, and recite, "There's no place like home." When I opened my eyes, I was still in Japan. I bow to no one in my American-ness, but when I have been in Japan all the times since, it is as if I were in my other home.
Not that any of this has anything to do with the article...
“I would from time to time close my eyes, click the slippers three times, and recite, “There’s no place like home.” When I opened my eyes, I was still in Japan.”
Probably because it can work only in the land of Oz.