Life is Beautiful: Two friends on a lake reflect on Mayan roots at Tikal, war and peace, and the hope we pass to our children

Aníbal de Paz was a young man in Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, Alta Verapaz, Guatemala, when I was a young man living there at the turn of the century. He had been born into war in the 80s, became a runner for the resistance as a boy, was a teenager as peace broke out in the 90s, and in his 20s, when we met and became friends, he was driver and confidant for his father, Don Ceferino de Paz González, my guest in episode 286, when he became Mayor.

Aníbal carries a presence of hard-won wisdom, born of a unique life, with a prominent Maya Achí father, and quietly formidable mother. And he speaks with such poetic sensibility, though scarcely literate in the formal sense. 

All this comes to the fore all the more, as we’ve just spent the day at the ancient Mayan city of Tikal, along with Anibal’s wife, Q’eqchí woman Josefina Choc Tiul, and their wonderful daughters. It was the children’s first visit. 

At the end of an exhausting day, both our families settled into bed, while we headed out to have one last conversation, plenty of it we’d never talked about, before saying our farewells. They were to head back to Fray before the dawn.

You’re about to hear a deeply felt and observed profile of a life, a country, and in many ways, a global dynamic that many of us are feeling more acutely these days. It is raw and real, hopeful and instructive, about power, choices of life and death, and how to navigate generational shifts in times like these.

It’s my privilege to have landed in the midst of Aníbal’s story through a couple of narrow windows, yet wide enough to be able to share this with you now.

It was still noisy on the street out front, near the town of El Remate in El Petén province. So we soon moved down to the beautiful Lake Petén Itzá, via a now permanently flooded jetty, and found a boat. 

Thanks again to old mate from those first Guatemala times, Dana ‘Patricio’ Scott, for so generously translating and speaking the Spanish in English.

Recorded 18 January 2025.

Title image: Aníbal on the jetty the day before (pic: Anthony James).

See more photos on the episode web page, and for more behind the scenes, become a supporting listener below. 

Music:

Salta Montes, by Migra (from Artlist).

Regeneration, by Amelia Barden.

The RegenNarration playlist, music chosen by guests. 

Chapters

• 0:00 Under The Stars At Lake Petén
• 6:10 Tikal, Roots, And Living Memory
• 17:35 Why Great Cities Collapse
• 31:50 Demobilization And Cooperative Paths
• 40:45 Childhood In War And Dehumanization
• 57:30 Learning To Cry And Forgive
• 1:05:20 Peace Accords, Referendum, Lost Hopes
• 1:18:30 Power, Palm Oil, And Silencing
• 1:28:40 Fatherhood And A New Compass
• 1:34:50 Music, Memory, And Closing Thanks