"His first question was whether I felt their ancestors' spirits," says Menno Goedhart, stepping out of a Rukai ancestral spirit house on a May afternoon. "I didn't answer him." Still mulling the particular atmosphere of the place, he adds, "On the other hand, I certainly felt the Rukai's heart and sincerity in the tiny ancestral spirit house."

Rain and clouds shroud the peaks above the village, which sits on the banks of the Lijia River in Beinan Township, Taitung County. In the afternoon, Goedhart and the Taromak, the Rukai tribe that live here, hold a peace ceremony, amicably resolving a bloody Rukai-Dutch conflict that dates back 350 years.

Goedhart and the Tamorak branch of the Rukai people recently brought a 300-year-old conflict between the Dutch East India Company and the Tamorak to a formal close. In the photos at left, the tribespeople and Goedhart drink millet wine representing family togetherness, sharing joined cups to seal their alliance following a ceremony to the ancestors.

In the Rukai language, Taromak means "the place where brave men live." More than 300 years ago, the Dutch-Taiwan's first foreign rulers-acting through the Dutch East India Company, sent a small troop of soldiers to explore eastern Taiwan. According to tribal legend, this group of "odd-looking, oddly dressed men with smoking mouths" dashed up to the headwaters of the Lijia River. Judging the strangers to have ill intentions, two young girls at the headwaters rushed back to the nearby village to report the soldiers' arrival. The village elders responded by dispatching a group of their own warriors to confront the enemy. Making use of their knowledge of the terrain, the warriors drove the Dutch away, cutting out the tongue of one of the soldiers before releasing him, to prevent him revealing the village's location.

"The legend has been passed down to the present day," says Goedhart. "I'm sure the Rukai must also have suffered injuries. Unfortunately, there's too little information to know."

Goedhart first heard the story in 2004, when his Netherlands Trade and Investment Office (NTIO) arranged a traveling exhibition of 17th-century artifacts of the Dutch presence on Taiwan. When the artifacts were exhibited at Pingtung's Taiwan Indigenous Culture Park, they drew a number of Rukai and Paiwan visitors.

"I chatted with many indigenous visitors during the exhibition, and heard a great many stories," says Goedhart. In addition to the tale of the Tamorak conflict, Goedhart heard that the Dutch and Rukai had intermarried and that their descendents lived in Wutai Township, Pingtung County. "But nobody knew any of these stories in their entirety. They were always just little bits of disconnected information."

Goedhart has eaten in indigenous villages all over Taiwan, and has frequently been invited to judge cooking contests. In the picture at right, an old Rukai friend invites him to tuck in to local fare.

Were the stories merely legends? Or did they represent as-yet unwritten history? Goedhart searched through Dutch East India Company documents held by Leiden University looking for answers, and visited the locations in question to investigate the stories' claims.

Goedhart's efforts turned up information from 1651 indicating that the Taromak were indeed one of the tribes contacted by the East India Company and that they had been classified as "hostile." Working with Chen Chengfu, a graduate student in linguistics at National Taiwan University who studies the Rukai language, Goedhart also confirmed that the contact with the Taromak had resulted in bloodshed.

Last December, Goedhart used his holiday to introduce his wife, Ingrid, to the Taromak. Lravalius Molraos, the Taromak chief who showed them around, recalls: "We chatted, then felt we could hold a ceremony to put an end to this historical animosity."

During the ceremony, Lravalius Molraos presented Goedhart with a traditional Rukai machete, joking: "We aren't afraid that the Dutch will cut off our heads!" After the two had downed a few cups of millet wine, he took Goedhart into the ancestral spirit house, access to which is traditionally restricted to tribespeople, where he told the ancestors what had happened and prayed for their understanding and blessing.

Goedhart has been an honorary member of the Rukai tribe for many years and is recognized as a "chief" of Kinulan Village in Wutai Township. This "in-laws" relationship actually dates back to the early 20th century.

About 100 years ago, a Dutchman visited the mountain village of Kinulan, where he married the chief's daughter and became a member of the tribe. The Rukai still cherish the memory of the man they named Daganau, and tell stories of his metal household utensils, his hunting rifle, and his many adventures helping those in trouble. The Rukai say that Goedhart possesses the same azure eyes and goodwill towards their tribe as his predecessor. They have therefore call him Daganau as well, and have named him the second Dutch chief in Kinulan's history.

This is the Goedharts' new home in Xinhua Township, Tainan County. Goedhart's title will change with the move-from the Netherlands' trade representative in Taiwan to Taiwan's "Tourism Ambassador to Europe."

Goedhart's friendship with Taiwan's indigenous peoples is simply one facet of the deep affection this "old Taiwan hand" feels for the island.

Surprisingly, Goedhart knew almost nothing of Taiwan prior to being assigned here in 2002. Virtually everything he's learned has been acquired during his eight years in-country.

Born in The Hague, the seat of the Dutch government, Goedhart first represented his country at the bridge table.

A skilled bridge player, he has played for the national team. "Our whole family plays cards well," he says. "My grandmother won championships in her age group well into her 90s."

He has an excellent memory that has served him well at the card table. "I can sometimes remember the sequence in which all 52 cards are played in each of the 128 rounds of a week-long tournament," he says. "Every single one."

Reading people is an important part of bridge. Once he has his own cards in his hand, Goedhart is even better at guessing his opponents' cards from the play of emotions on their faces, and uses this knowledge to understand their play.

"Even the mood of the audience can tell you a lot," Goedhart adds. Even though he hasn't played competitively in more than a decade, his face lights up when talking about the game. He explains that in a formal tournament, the table is set up in the middle of the hall with the audience arrayed around all four sides. "If someone gets a really good card, you can sense a vague excitement in the audience," he explains. "You don't need to see your opponents' cards because the audience already has. Their reactions give you clues." He says that he has won several matches relying on the audience's reactions.

A biochemistry major at university, Goedhart worked as an engineer at a polyester fiber manufacturing plant after graduating. In 1979, he began what was to be a 31-year career as a public servant by taking a job with the Netherlands Ministry of Economic Affairs. His work eventually took him to Paris, where he spent the six years immediately prior to his assignment to the NTIO in Taiwan.

"The Dutch once ruled Taiwan, so many Dutch feel something special when conversation turns to the island," says Goedhart. "But I knew absolutely nothing about the place. And my wife and I really loved Paris, which made it hard for us to adjust to the sudden news that we were going to be leaving Europe far behind." Over the years, Goedhart has gone from being someone who never imagined he'd be in Taiwan for so long to someone who has developed closer-than-blood ties to the island.

The Goedharts' home in Tienmu is filled with indigenous cultural artifacts, each of which has a story behind it.

In spatial terms, some 9,906 nautical miles separate Kaohsiung Harbor from the Port of Rotterdam via the Suez Canal. In temporal terms, more than 300 years separate the Dutch's abrupt departure from Taiwan in 1662 and the two nations' reconnection in 1970.

That was the year that Royal Philips Electronics, the world's largest electronics manufacturer, announced that it was investing more than US$20 million in Taiwan to build CRT TVs. The project marked the Netherlands' first major investment in Taiwan in the modern era. Over the next two decades and more, trade, biotechnology, and semiconductors, as well as the Netherlands' advanced logistics and position as the gateway to Europe, provided both nations with tremendous business opportunities. In recent years, bilateral trade has held steady at around US$5-6 billion per annum, making each one of the other's most important trading partners.

"Though we are physically very distant from one another, we're very similar," says Goedhart. He explains that both Taiwan and the Netherlands are small and wealthy, possess excellent ports, depend upon trade, value education, and stress the cultivation of an international perspective.

Even more importantly, both have a profoundly maritime character, with the flexibility, liberal outlook, and receptiveness to information and products from abroad that tend to go with that. "Western-style communication works in Taiwan. Dutch businesspeople rarely encounter situations they can't adjust to," he says. "As a result, the Dutch enjoy dealing with Taiwanese and are comfortable doing business here."

When the Dutch controlled Taiwan (1624-1661), there were few Han Chinese on the island. The Dutch colonizers instead ruled over a largely indigenous population. Fascinated by the period of Dutch and Spanish rule, Menno Goedhart has used clues from indigenous oral histories to track down traces of his ancestors. In doing so, he's become fast friends with Taiwan's indigenous peoples. In fact, his cap, jacket, bag, and machete are all gifts from indigenous friends.

Trade between the two nations reached the US$6-billion mark in 1998 and has remained at that level for the last decade. Throughout this period, "Goedhart has taken a steady, proactive approach to promoting bilateral trade," observes Walter H.C. Chang, chairman of Holmsgreen Holdings and of the Taiwan-Netherlands Joint Business Council (TNJBC). "Though Goedhart is a towering 190 centimeters tall and likes to joke, he's always promoted bilateral exchanges with a careful, steady hand."

Because Taiwan and the Netherlands lack formal diplomatic relations, the TNJBC has been an important platform for political and commercial exchanges between the two nations since its establishment more than two decades ago. But, as with all organizations that have been around for a while, the meetings always featured the same faces and little was accomplished.

Recognizing the problem, Goedhart has sought to push the meetings out of their rut. "In 2008, Goedhart proposed allowing more small and medium-sized enterprises to attend," recalls Chang with admiration. "He also pushed hard to move that year's conference to Taichung from its usual spot in Taipei. Not surprisingly, many SMEs participated in the 2008 conference."

Since the Netherlands has built itself on business, "it doesn't worry about close ties between government and business," adds Chang. "Their government officials have always opened the way for their businesses." He says that Goedhart has maintained this tradition, working hard to further bilateral economic and trade relations.

His first two years here saw the most intensive exchange of official visits between Taiwan and the Netherlands in the two nations' history. These included not just groups studying investment opportunities, but also more than one visit to Taiwan by the head of the Netherlands' Agency for International Trade and Cooperation and its Director-General for Foreign Economic Relations.

Goedhart makes no bones about his fondness for Taiwan. Huang Siliang, head of Stichting Taiwan Shian Chin in the Netherlands, offers an example: "Whenever he goes back to the Netherlands, whether on business or for pleasure, he always takes advantage of the opportunity to promote Taiwan. We like to joke that when this Netherlands representative goes back to the Netherlands he represents Taiwan."

Goedhart and the Tamorak branch of the Rukai people recently brought a 300-year-old conflict between the Dutch East India Company and the Tamorak to a formal close. In the photos at left, the tribespeople and Goedhart drink millet wine representing family togetherness, sharing joined cups to seal their alliance following a ceremony to the ancestors.

"It feels like he doesn't just look out for the Netherlands' interest in Taiwan, that he cares equally for Taiwan's interests in the Netherlands," says Huang.

This past May, Kuan Bi-ling, a Democratic Progressive Party legislator, discovered that the website of the Netherlands' Ministry of Foreign Affairs placed its Taiwan trade office, Beijing embassy, and Guangzhou, Hong Kong, and Shanghai consular offices all under a "China" heading, tacitly suggesting that Taiwan is a part of China. Goedhart not only immediately responded to Kuan's concern, but also got the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs to update its website in just two days.

"When people first meet him, they see a warm, amiable man," says a Taiwanese friend. "But he also has a more aggressive side and places great emphasis on efficiency when dealing with certain issues."

"Given Taiwan's peculiar international status, it's naturally a good thing to have someone speaking bluntly on Taiwan's behalf," says another friend. "But I pray that he doesn't get himself hurt as a result."

"Some people think he speaks too much and too directly, given that he's a diplomat," continues the friend. "It's not how diplomats usually do things." The friend notes that it's a diplomat's job to avoid explicitly declaring a position. "But I think the fact that he let's you see his real self is one of his appeals."

"Something even more unique about Goedhart compared to other trade representatives is his interest in culture," says Chen Zhexiong, president of ASML, Taiwan, a subsidiary of Dutch semiconductor equipment manufacturer ASML. "He truly believes that culture can bring people together and that it provides a positive, long-term foundation for trade and cooperation." Chen first met Goedhart through work. Over time, the two men and their families became friends, and now get their families together for a meal whenever Goedhart's children visit Taiwan.

After the reconciliation ceremony, Goedhart visits the studio of the sculptor Ha Ku, a 69th-generation chief of the Puyuma tribe, where he strikes a pose in the style of one of the heroic figures.

Work permitting, Goedhart likes to take long weekends and uses them to travel Taiwan. Over the last eight years, dozens of long weekends have enabled him to visit virtually the whole island. As he says himself, he's seen more of Taiwan than most Taiwanese.

At first, these trips were simply quick excursions to take in the sights, but over time they turned into deep explorations of both Taiwan and the Netherlands. "Taiwan has many Dutch artifacts, especially in Tainan, Chiayi, Hualien, and Taitung," he says. "Unfortunately, they've typically been something that only locals know about. It's only in recent years that they've begun to attract wider attention."

"In Chiayi, for example, everyone knows about the 'red-hair [Dutch] well' and the 'red-hair tablet,' but only a few local elders know about the remains of the Dutch fort on the coast in Budai Township."

Though the Dutch ruled Taiwan for only a short time (1624-1662), they completed some major projects. In the case of Tainan's Fort Zeelandia, they also implemented advanced city planning concepts, including the construction of inner and outer walls, observation and canon platforms, and a gallows representing their authority. The remains of a "trade station" found by the Tainan Cultural Affairs Bureau during a 2006 exploratory dig also suggests the existence of a well developed trade in commercial and everyday goods.

"Naturally, the contemporaneous maps are quite different from modern maps," says Goedhart. "As a result, even though we have the records in the several thick volumes of the historical De Dagregisters van het Kasteel Zeelandia, we remain unclear about the precise locations of the places mentioned." Goedhart's method-comparing the stories of the elders to the old maps and documents-has uncovered many long-forgotten sites.

Goedhart's approach to unearthing artifacts is very scientific. He first collects legends and anecdotes, then traces them to likely real-world locations where he looks for material evidence, e.g. a tile structure poking up out of an earthen mound, a shattered household item, or even genetic traces in the faces of locals.

In 2006, Goedhart's method led him to a Dutch East India Company fort on Penghu's Mt. Shetou. Once he'd found it, he applied to the Dutch government for funds to restore it to its original form.

This kind of green-glazed pot, known to the Aborigines as a "Dutch jar," actually originated in Thailand. The Dutch used them to store palm oil before trading them to Taiwan's indigenous peoples.

Though Goedhart's eight years in Taiwan have passed quickly, he believes that the bridges reconnecting Taiwan and the Netherlands after 300 years of separation will be difficult to sunder. Goedhart himself certainly plans to maintain his connection to the island-at the beginning of the year he was struck with the notion of retiring here. His wife, Ingrid, recalls her surprise when he broached the subject, but she soon understood.

"Strangers smile and invite us into their homes for tea so often when we're out strolling through the countryside," says Ingrid. "I've never experienced that kind of hospitality before." She says that she is more introverted than her husband and has visited far fewer places, "but I enjoy the cordiality." Her only condition for accepting his proposal was: "He has to take me wherever he goes!"

"Just one week after we bade farewell to Paris and arrived in Taipei, I was in love with the place," says Goedhart. He still enjoys jokingly proclaiming to the French that Taipei is better than Paris. "I love seeing the French puff up with outrage," he says.

Ingrid has been taking classes since January to improve her already very good Chinese. Goedhart, too, has begun attending three-hour classes twice a week. "I still have a lot of difficulty with the four tones of spoken Chinese," he admits. "I often mix up the pronunciation of 'q??ng' ['to treat someone'] with 'q?‾n' ['to kiss'], and end up using 'I'll treat you' and 'I'll kiss you' in the wrong places."

In addition to taking classes, the couple has rented a home in Xinhua Township, Tainan, that has a courtyard in front and a mountainside out back. Goedhart originally intended to spend his retirement strolling the countryside and looking for as-yet undiscovered Dutch artifacts, but also recently accepted an invitation from the Tourism Bureau to act as Taiwan's "ambassador of tourism" to Europe and put his love of Taiwan to good use.

"My career in public service is coming to an end," says Goedhart, looking off into the distance as he stands in front of his new home in Xinhua. "But my life in Taiwan is entering a new phase." Will Taiwan become his new home in the full sense of the word? Goedhart must be filled with both pleasure and anticipation at the prospect.

Goedhart used to leave his wife Ingrid in Taipei while he spent many a long weekend hiking the island. When the couple decided to retire in Tainan, Ingrid had just one condition: he had to bring her along on his travels. In the photo, the couple enjoy a leisurely cup of tea at their official residence in Taipei's Tienmu.

After the reconciliation ceremony, Goedhart visits the studio of the sculptor Ha Ku, a 69th-generation chief of the Puyuma tribe, where he strikes a pose in the style of one of the heroic figures.