Mariah shares Thanksgiving with Japan foster-care kids
International pop star Mariah Carey spent Thursday evening with Japanese children from a foster care home in Tokyo as her way of celebrating Thanksgiving Day during her current album promotional trip here. Carey is visiting Japan for the first time in about two and a half years to promote her latest album "Charmbracelet" released here on Nov 20. She had expressed a wish to spend time on Thanksgiving with children, for whom she has a special spot.
"In America, Thanksgiving Day is a very big holiday for us, and seeing how we weren't going to be at home, I thought it would be nice to not only have dinner for everybody that is with me traveling but to do something for the children who are coming today," she said. In an interview at a Tokyo hotel preceding the dinner event with 15 children from Seibi Home - which hosts 160 children ages 2 to 18 mostly from broken families - she stressed that the "whole point of Thanksgiving is obviously to give thanks and to give something back to other people".
According to Carey, she often focuses on charity work for children, saying she believes that helping them in their formative years "can help make a difference". The 32-year-old singer, who experienced a sad childhood with her parents' divorce, is also deeply involved in various charities back home such as Camp Mariah of the Fresh Air Fund. She added that she believes she was blessed by having a supportive mother and "having music in my life". Carey herself recently went through personal ordeals such as extreme exhaustion from work last year and her father's death this past summer.
Citing her latest single "Through the Rain" as a positive song of hope, faith and perseverance, Carey said the message she wants to convey to Japanese children is in the song, which she described as "very personal" at a news conference earlier this week. "No matter what comes your way, just really being positive and believing that you can get through it," she said about the song as her message to children in Japan, especially those undergoing troubled times in their lives.
In the dinner event itself at the same hotel, representatives of the children's group at Seibi Home in Tokyo's Kita Ward said in an address before giving a song performance that they would always treasure the moment of being with her, and asked her to continue singing beautiful songs. The children, who came to the venue ahead of the event for rehearsal of their performance, looked excited to see her although they seemed not fully aware of her superstar status. The Grammy-winning singer made her debut in 1990 and has released 12 albums, selling about 150 million records worldwide. Her hit singles include "Vision of Love", "Love Takes Time", "Hero", and "I'll Be There". (Japan Today) Many thanks to MariahC.nu.
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