During his first tour abroad, Gurudev had written to his devotees in a letter about what all those picturesque places lack as compared to similar places in our motherland, India :
Nowhere is the Indian spiritual atmosphere. There is grandeur, glory, beauty, wealth, organisation, luxury, energetic enthusiasm, poetry, intellectual eminence, kindness, consideration, love – all these are there at places.
But the peace of contentment, the sense of divinity of life, the silence of joy, the serenity of poise, the luxury of self-control, the beauty of the higher self-sacrifices, which together make up the spiritual presence in the Indian atmosphere is totally absent in these places.