The 1991 visit in Prague was great and I missed the city where I grew up. Next year, in 1992, I went again to Prague for 2 weeks, this time by myself. I stayed again with Jan Kotva family. I also visited some of my cousins, notably my cousin, Peter Kralik, in Slovakia and my cousin, Tona (Antonin Valach), in Prague, the last time I would ever see them. We had a great time and again Honza and his family were great hosts.

I told Honza that for retirement, I would like to live somewhere in or near Prague. Honza showed me his land he had very near Prague and told me that we could build on that land 2 houses, one for him and one for me. He knew many people and was sure he can have it built for minimal cost. I told him that I would be interested.

When I was leaving, I tried to buy some wrought iron items from iron workers who were exhibiting on the Old Time square, but I missed them. I left some money with Honza to buy it for me when the iron workers come back.

 Honza called me in early January, 1993, that he would like to start to build the 2 houses and asked me to send him $250,000, to be able to start the building project. I told him I do not have such cash savings, even though I made good money, and that I have to talk to bank to get a loan. Honza called again a week later, asking if I did get the money. I told him no, that it will take time. He said that he needs it now and if I don’t have the money, he has some other friend who is interested in building house with him under the same arrangement. I told Honza that, in such case, he should go ahead with his friend, since I cannot get money fast enough.

To my surprise, in early February 1993, I got a call at my work from Mila, Honza’s wife. She said that Honza died, one week after a heart transplant. I was shocked that Honza would not tell me that he is planning to have a heart transplant, because I would try to arrange for his heart transplant in the USA. The Czech doctors did not have that much experience with heart transplants at that time. I asked Mila if Honza had a chance to buy me the wrought iron items. She said no; she does not know anything about Honza’s finances since he kept everything in his electronic planner, the battery died, and everything was lost.

After I got over the shock, I thought about it and realized that Honza knew the risk associated with the heart transplant and he wanted to leave as much money for his family as he can if he would die. And since he wanted money from me, he did not want me to know about it. Needless to say, I was glad that I did not send him the money he asked for.

When I was visiting Prague in 2018, I went to the Archive of Secret Police Files and obtained access to their online files, accessible via ebadatelna.cz web site. Not all files are there, but to my surprise I found the file on Jan Kotva, my friend. He was recruited by Czech army counterintelligence 3 month after we were drafted for the 2 years service to spy specifically on me, and 3 other soldiers. His controlling officer, Captain Josef Uruba, trained him, using his being kicked out of school for the May Day student demonstration, as part of gaining our confidence. He was trained how to watch us to potentially attempt any sabotage. Four of us were specifically named for our “dangerous” political background: in my case, because my father had a high government position and was two times in prison for actions against the communist state; in the case of Ginter Bedrunka, for his uncle being a WWII pilot who stayed in England; in Rudolf (Risa) Wagner’s case, his uncle was thirteen years in prison for actions against the Communist state; and Bohumir Cuhel, for being a Catholic priest. Kotva was reporting on us for the remainder of the two years in the army. He also reported on his own, not ordered to, on one other soldier, Jiri Cerny . The funny thing is, that for his reporting, he received at one point a reward of 50 Kcs, which was like $10.

After the army, in October 1964, the army counterintelligence transferred him under the control of the secret police in Prague. His job was, again, to spy on his former soldier comrades, meaning me, and newly on some people in the theater academy Kotva was attending.  The specific names were Jelena Palouskova, Sarka Lipska, Jiri Klem, Jana Cihakova, Zuzana Kocova, Milos Janda, Mirian Kantorkova, Petr Novak and Blanka Dvorakova. Kotva kept working for the secret police until one year after I left Czechoslovakia. The secret police released him in October 1966 from his contract, because Kotva was beaten by some uniformed cops at night in Prague; the cops also damaged his nice leather jacket. Kotva tried to use his secret police connections against the uniformed police, but they were not helpful. Kotva was very disappointed and did not want to continue to work for the secret police anymore. He also was, at that time, traveling with the theater group called Maringotka. He was not spending lots of time in Prague to keep meeting his assigned “friends”. As a final determination, he was allowed to end the contract and since he delivered on his assignments extremely well, both for the army counterintelligence and later for the secret police, he was free to travel to the west, if and anytime he wanted to.

So, this is the end of story about my dear “friend” Jan Kotva. He chose as his code name, Jan Hamlet. Throughout the time I knew him, I never suspected that he became my friend on the orders of army counterintelligence and that it was his job to report specifically on me to them and later to the secret police in Prague. Even with all my life experiences and after all the time passed since then, I felt hurt by it, even though I should know better.