Cactus Shadows group spends time in nation’s capital
Staff Report ~ 12/14/2011

Barbara Hatch, a history teacher at Cactus Shadows High School and four members of the school’s Veterans Heritage Project club spent four days (Dec. 1 – 4) in Washington D.C., Along with seeing the historic sites of the nation’s capital, the group consisting of Nima Sadeghi, Guy Chadwick, Madi Pascale and Cody Inglis also made a presentation about their club to the National Council for the Social Studies. The club interviews Arizona military veterans for a periodical they produce each year called Since You Asked, Arizona Veterans Share Their Memories.
Below is a recap of the trip written by Nima Sadeghi
Greeted in the US Capitol by the Occupy D.C. protesters on Thursday morning was a pleasant surprise that showed Madi, Guy, Cody, Mrs. Hatch, and myself that our time there was going to be interesting.  We walked down to our hotel to drop off our bags and were off to explore the city.  With Siri as our navigator, we walked to the convention center for our first tour, but the National Council for The Social Studies had not booked us any tours.  Consequently, we were free to do what we liked.
We left the convention center, and after a quick bite to eat in Chinatown, went on our tour of the monuments at night. We started by walking past the White House, where “stuff goes down,” and progressed to the Washington Monument where we saw the National Christmas Tree. Not wanting the fun to end, we found our way to the World War II Memorial and from there the Vietnam Wall, the Korean Memorial, and the Lincoln Memorial. Exhausted from our first day—remember our flight left Phoenix at 6 a.m. —Mrs. Hatch and Cody led us back to our hotel. But before reaching our hotel, we walked in on an Occupy D.C. meeting, and learned a new form of voting: “twinkles up, twinkles down.”
The next day was our chance to get a closer look inside the White House, thanks to Congressman Schweikert’s office and, amazingly, it was the only day of the year that pictures could be taken in the White House. One hundred pictures later, we left the President’s home and began our walk to the Capitol for our tour. Though it was long, we once again walked through the Occupy D.C. camps and gained a little more insight into their desires. When we got to the Capitol we were awed by the beauty of the structure and were all amazed by the interior of the building.  The Statue of Liberty could fit inside the central rotunda, with room to spare. After the Capitol we went to the Library of Congress to meet with the Head of the Veterans’ History Project, Colonel Bob Patrick, whom we hope will be our guest speaker at our April reception. Following the meeting, we met Alex Lazo and Robby Boccelli at Capitol Grill, stopping by the Supreme Court House for some pictures.
With two days left, we made our trip to Arlington Cemetery and there paid respects to the endless rows of male and female veterans laid to rest on the land.  On our trip to the cemetery, we met two men from the Occupy D.C. protest.  The two men were very interesting, and woke us up from our morning glaze. Talking to them for a while made some of us feel they were crazy, while the other part of us thought they were very interesting. We left them and continued our way to Arlington. I myself was searching for the Revolutionary War graves, while Mrs. Hatch was looking for the Civil War memorial, Guy his relatives, Madi her great aunt. Though we did not see it all in the six hours we were there, we made a dent, and so we left to eat and meet Mrs. Hatch’s old students, Lori and Shelly, from her Virgin Island days. Though in their 40s, they had the spirit of teenagers as they whisked us away to see the beautiful MLK and FDR memorials.  Before we knew it, it was nine, and we had to walk back to the hotel.
Finally Sunday morning came, and it was time to give our NCSS presentation. We had a great time talking to Renée Allen, a veteran of Desert Shield, and getting to know the teachers who did come. The presentation lasted roughly two hours so we conversed as a group for the rest of the time, and when it was time to go, we left our new friend Renée and walked back to our hotel to leave. But of course, we could not leave D.C. without a finale. And so, as we walked to the Metro, we saw our good friends at the Occupy D.C. camp being arrested for building a pentagon-shaped house in the middle of the McPherson Park. There were police lining the perimeter, sirens going off, chanting, and shouting, and as we took the escalator down to the Metro, the noise got quieter, and when it was gone…we had finally left D.C., though not without playing on a wood swing suspended from the handrails on our Metro ride by some college kids.