CURIOSITY SHOPPING.

I'm not sure why I so rarely venture beyond my home turf to shop for the holidays. Sloth and habit, like an invisible cattle fence, have confined me to an outgrazed pasture. After the elections, however, I felt a pressing need to expand my horizons. My maternal grandfather baked kipferl for the last Hapsburg emperor, and, even though that was a century ago, I briefly thought that I might be eligible for Hungarian citizenship. When I couldn't find his birth certificate (his only legacies were a rolling pin and a pinochle deck), I resolved to start by living less provincially in my native city.

Perhaps most destinations in a globalized world are more mundane than ...