ERIC SMULDERS

A Lust for Life
Eric Smulders van Heer Janspolder

A Lust for Life

A Lust for Life
Eric Smulders van Heer Janspolder
1938–present

Copyright © 2022 Eric Smulders van Heer Janspolder.
Typeset in Goudy Old Style.
Printed and bound in the UK.

Dedication:
Patrick
I dedicate this book to Alexander, my best oldest son, Patrick, my best second son
and Pier, my best third son.
Thank you, Patrick, for offering me the contract with LifeBook as a Christmas
present in 2019, without which my autobiography would never have been written.
You and your brothers are the superstars of my life. This autobiography describes
my life: exciting, stressful, chaotic, and happy. My multi-faceted, not exemplary
romantic life, which started in the red-light district in The Hague at the ripe age
of 16, has been treated with suitable discretion.
Never give up... bad grass never dies.
With love, Daddy

CONTENTS
Prologue
Eric’s family 11
Smulders Family History 3
Timeline – Eric Smulders 47
1. Early Life 51
2. University Years 67
3. Young Adulthood and My Early Career 1961–1962 73
4. Shell 1964–1972 and the Start of My Life in Japan 79
5. Siber Hegner 1972–1979 101
6. Cartier 1979–1983 117
7. Friesland Foods 1983–2005, Sailing Escapades and My Real Estate
Investments 123
8. Hong Kong and My Career as an International Art Dealer 149
9. “Happy Retirement” in Phuket 167
Appendix A 209
Appendix B 215
Appendix C 219
ix
vii

PROLOGUE
This life story was written bearing in mind my artistic character and ability to
remember many things in multicolour and multidimensions.
My great appreciation and love go to the Nestor of the family, Francis, my oldest
brother and the walking encyclopaedia of our family history, without whom the
family data in this book would not have been available.
The story I have told in this book is for general informational purposes only. These are
my recollections and thoughts. All information of the memories herein is provided
in good faith. I make no representation or warranty of any kind, express or implied,
regarding the accuracy, adequacy, validity, reliability, availability, completeness, or
veracity of any of the information contained herein.
ix

My brother Francis, the family “Nestor” (on the right) and Felix, his partner of 53 years
Never give up! Go where others don’t dare to go … follow your instincts!
x

ERIC’S FAMILY
Eric’s Parents:
Henri A.J.M. Smulders ML
(Master of Laws)
3/4/1908–19/2/1997
Dame Marguerite J.G.A. Waucquez ML 29/1/1908–1/3/2010
Eric and his brothers:
Francis Smulders MD 1931– Ophthalmic Surgeon
Robert Smulders MSc Mechanical
Engineering
(ex-Honorary Consul-General of The
Netherlands in Monaco)
1933– Industrialist/
Shipbuilder
Maurice Smulders ML 1935–2019 Industrialist/
Entrepreneur
Eric Smulders DEc., MBA (Master of
Business Administration)
Dr Louis Smulders PhD Physics.
Managing Director of Royal IHC
Americas.
1938– Entrepreneur
1940– Physicist/Entrepreneur
Harry Smulders DEc., MBA 1944– Entrepreneur
Paul (Seven) Smulders ML and CEM
(Certified in Exhibition Management)
(Honorary Consul of the Kingdom of The
Netherlands for the provinces of Phuket,
Krabi, Phang Nga and Suratthani: Dean
of the Consular Corps in Phuket)
1948– Entrepreneur/Specialist
in trade promotion,
international
exhibitions and events
11

Eric’s children:
Alexander, born 1963 – MSc
Patrick, born 1965 – MBA
Pier, born 1973 – MBA
Eric’s grandchildren:
Alexander’s children:
Ivar – BSc
Etoile – BSc
Asia – BSc
Declan (Dutchy)
Henry
Patrick’s children:
Tristan
Caspian
Pier’s children:
Mathilda
Beatrix
Frederik
12

How it all started... Brussels, 29th April 1930
13

Smulders family tree – my position enhanced for clarity of position
14

Me and my “superstars” on my 80th birthday. From left: Pier, me, Alex, Patrick.
15

Alex and his beautiful wife, Alice
16

Ivar
17

Etoile
18

Asia
19

My wonderful grandson, Dutchy (Declan)
20

My wonderful grandson, Henry
21

Patrick and family: Patrick, Kiki, Tristan and Caspian
22

Patrick with Tristan
23

Patrick with Caspian
24

Patrick with the boys
25

My cowboy son, Patrick
26

Patrick and his sons at an Ajax match
27

Patrick, Tristain and Caspian at Christmas
28

Pier and family. From left: Freddie, Charlotte, Mathilda, Beatrix and Pier
29

Mathilda and Pier
30

Beatrix catching her first fish in Northland, New Zealand
31

Freddie
32

SMULDERS FAMILY HISTORY
The Smulders dynasty can be traced back to 1384. Members of the Smulders
family always worked as gentlemen landowners. From the middle of the 19th
century onwards they became founders and owners of many industrial enterprises.
The industrial beginnings date from around 1845 when Willem Hendrik Smulders
(1815–1883) became one of the leading steam engine builders in the Netherlands,
based in Tilburg. His eldest son August Frans Smulders (1838–1908) built the first
steam engine and specialised in steel construction in the Netherlands. He became
one of the leading figures in the Dutch industrial revolution.
Members of later generations were founder owners of the following industrial
enterprises:
• Tilburg: Willem Hendrik steam engines, 1845
• Bois-le-Duc (now known as s’Hertogenbosch): AF Smulders, shipyards and metal
constructions, 1862
• Utrecht: AF Smulders, foundries and engine construction, 1872
• Utrecht: Louis Smulders & Co; engine factory called Jaffa/Stork, later part of the
VMF Group, 1872
• Schiedam: AF Smulders, shipyard Gusto, 1905
• IJmuiden: Henri and Frans Smulders, founders and shareholders of Netherlands
Steelworks (later Koninklijke Hoogovens, nowadays Tata Steel), 1918
• Other sons of AF Smulders:
• Louis inherited NV Chaudronneries AF Smulders, at Grâce-Berleur near Liège,
Belgium (500 staff)
• Piet inherited Canoy Herfkens Steenfabrieken in Venlo, Netherlands (350 staff)
33

AF Smulders (1838–1908). Painting by Henri Luyten. Knight Order of Orange Nassau
(Dutch), Commander Order of the Holy Virgin of Villa Viçosa (Kingdom of Portugal),
Knight Order of Médjidié (Great Ottoman Empire)
34

AF Smulders residence. “Les Tourelles”, Boulevard Tsarevich, Parc Russe, Nice
35

My great-uncle, AF Smulders’ oldest son, Henri PAJ Smulders 1863–1933. Painting by
Thérèse Schwartze. Order of the Italian Crown (Order of the Iron Crown), Order of Merit,
Knighthood by King Leopold I. (Belgium). Order of Merit, by King Stanislas II
36

My grandfather – Josephus Johannas Franciscus Maria (Frans Smulders) MSc (1871–1937).
Painting by Willem Maris Jzn. Officer in the Order of Orange Nassau (Dutch) Knight in the
Legion of Honour (France) Officer in the Order of Leopold II (Belgium) Commander in the
Order of the Holy Virgin of Villa Viçosa (Portugal) Medal of the Tsarist Red Cross in exile
37

Residence of Frans Smulders, now the residence of the Nuncio, the Papal
Ambassador, The Hague
38

Artist’s impression – Industrial complex, Bois-le-Duc (now known as s’Hertogenbosch):
AF Smulders, shipyard and metal construction, 1862
Artist’s impression – Schiedam: AF Smulders, shipyards: Werf Gusto, 1915
39

Helvetia – Frans Smulders was the first owner. She was built at the Gusto before the First
World War and my grandmother baptised her so, in celebration of her Swiss heritage. The
ship is now used as a UK Royal Navy training flagship. (Picture taken from own collection)
After the passing away of AF Smulders, the shipyard Gusto (with approximately
2,000 employees) was handed over to his sons, Henri (1863 s’Hertogenbosch–1933
Paris), who was also an avid sailor (he won the first Olympic silver medal for Holland
at the 1900 Summer Olympics in Paris, sailing his yacht in a mixed team race and
competed with a Dutch crew in both races of the 3–10 ton class, winning silver and
also taking fourth place), and Frans, my grandfather, who had studied engineering
at the Technikum Mittweida (now called The University of Applied Sciences,
Mittweida), in the Kingdom of Saxony, Germany. The other companies were taken
over by his other brothers or their heirs. The daughter of August Frans married
Frans Jurgens (of Anton Jurgens’ United Margarine Factories, which later became
the Unilever concern).
When my grandfather, who ran the Gusto shipyards, passed away in 1937 (probably
due to the huge pressure from the world economic crash of the 1930s) my father,
Henri Smulders, a young lawyer still in his twenties who had studied law at Leiden
University (Master of Law; ML), took over the full management of the company (with
now only approximately 200 employees due to the economic crisis, which in later
years fortunately recovered dramatically).
40

Wherf Gusto... 1970s. Taken from an article written by my late brother, Maurice
My father was forced to learn quickly ‘on the job’ (talk about being thrown in at
the deep end), which he did very successfully: later, in the 1960s, he was the leading
initiator and president of the merger of Gusto with four other shipyards, forming the
IHC Holland NV Group, which became a world leader in offshore engineering (ca.
5,000 employees).
SBM (Single Buoy Moorings) was founded by my second brother, Robert, under the
IHC umbrella in Bern, southern Switzerland and was later domiciled in Monte Carlo
(where he still lives and is still affectionately known as ‘The ex-Honorary General
Consul of The Netherlands in Monaco’ in every fashionable venue or club there).
This company pioneered and still dominates the world’s offshore mooring market
and floating oil production systems.
41

SBM (est. by Robert) are the world leaders in offshore mooring establishments
At this point I need to address some family history relating to my mother’s family.
Our maternal grandfather, Jules Waucquez (1868–1938), was a quite remarkable
gentleman. He was also a very successful entrepreneur, and a great collector of art.
Horses were his greatest hobby, so much so that it is said he rode every day at 6am.
In 1907 he won the first prize in a ‘four in one hand’ competition, which features
the incredible skill of not only driving a carriage (full of people) but doing this whilst
leading four horses with one hand. He was a deeply religious man and he built, at
his own expense, a church in Brussels devoted to Sainte Alix in memory of his own
daughter Alix who had died in 1933. At one time he was a member of the Belgian
Senate and was also a Knight in the Order of Leopold II. His offspring were raised in
Belgian nobility by King Baudouin of Belgium. He married our grandmother, Maria
van Glabbeek (1874–1951), in 1895.
42

My maternal grandparents, Jules Waucquez and Maria van Glabbeek.
Portraits by Eugène Huc
43

Painting celebrating Jules Waucquez’s “Four in Hand” victory in 1907
The consecration of Sainte-Alix, 1936 and today (overleaf)
44

Sainte-Alix church as it is now
45

TIMELINE – ERIC SMULDERS
17th May 1938 – Born in Schiedam, Holland.
1940 – Moved to Wassenaar due to the regular RAF bombing of Rotterdam’s
industrial areas.
November 1944–April 1945 – Moved to The Hague, to grandmother’s house when
Wassenaar was evacuated by the Germans who decided to use Wassenaar as their
base for launching V-1 and V-2 missiles.
April 1945 – Moved back to Wassenaar.
1946 – Moved back to Schiedam (near to Werf Gusto).
1947–1949 – Boarding school St Jozef in Zeist.
1949–1956 – Boarding school Jesuits, De Breul Zeist.
June 1956–1961 Netherlands School of Economics, MBA.
July 1961 – Married Marijke Fens.
September–December 1961 – Scholarship for PhD, Carnegie School of Technology,
Pittsburgh, USA.
January–February 1962 – Thew Shovel Company, Lorain, Ohio, USA.
February 1962 – Fired from the Cooking Pot direct sales company and later
McDonald’s.
March–September 1962 – Almacoa Ltd., salesman earthmoving equipment, Brussels,
Belgium.
47

September 1964–1968 – Royal Dutch Shell, Singapore and Malaysia
20th February 1963 – First son Alexander born in Brussels, Belgium.
3rd July 1965 – Second son Patrick is born in Singapore.
September 1968–June 1969 – Japanese studies, Asian Language School, University
of Sheffield.
November 1969 – Divorced from Marijke Fens.
1969–1972 – Shell Tokyo, studying Japanese together with a marketing job in liquid
gas.
July–September 1972 – Finance Manager, Shell Ethiopia. September – fired from
Shell.
1972–1979 – MD Siber Hegner Japan (SH) and aided the Hermès Group to open
their first boutique in Hong Kong.
1972 – Married Anne Marie Zwolsman, daughter of Reinder, then the Real Estate
tycoon of the Netherlands.
15th July 1973 – Third son Eric Pier was born in Yokohama, Japan.
1979 – Fired from Siber Hegner, Japan and studied the Harvard AMP.
1979 – MD, Cartier Far East, Hong Kong.
1983 – Fired from Cartier, Far East.
1983–2005 – MD, Friesland Foods, Hong Kong/China.
1998 – Split from second wife Anne Marie and start relationship with Elisabeth
Cassegrain (French).
2003 to present – Live in Phuket.
2006 to present – Opened Master Paintings Gallery, Hong Kong, and later opened
Soul of Asia, Art Gallery in Phuket.
48

2006 – Meet my present partner in Phuket, Oe (Uraiphan Sae-sin, Thai).
2008 – Split from Elisabeth Cassegrain.
2008 to present – Living in Phuket with Oe (Uraiphan Sae-sin, Thai).
49

CHAPTER ONE
Early Life
I
started my life on 17th May 1938 as the fourth son of Henri and Marguerite
Smulders-Waucquez (my mother was Belgian) and was born in Schiedam (near the
shipyards) in a large comfortable residence with three older brothers, some maids
and a nanny (Mies Schoof). In 1940, we moved to Wassenaar, an upmarket village
near The Hague, where I spent my early youth. As the fourth brother, I had to defend
myself against domination by the three older ones, and, as a result, I developed a
rather strong and maybe manipulative, anti-authoritarian and very competitive
character from very early on.
My father was a disciplined, authoritarian figure: principled, religious, but also loving
and very caring. He was strict and insisted on the best for all his sons. His wife, my
mother, was born and raised in Brussels in a leading Catholic family and educated in
a boarding school run by the strictest of nuns (Sacré Coeur). She once told me, maybe
half ashamed, that she never knew where the kitchen was in their vast residence in
the Avenue de Tervuren in Brussels. Together they formed a very successful, happy
and ambitious couple who got all of their seven sons to achieve master’s degrees in
various disciplines.
51

My father, Henri AJMS Smulders, M.L (Master of Laws – Leiden University) 1908–1997.
Painting by Karel van Veen 1975, Olie op doek op schildersboard.
Collectie Francis M. Smulders, Amsterdam
52

My mother Dame Marguerite Smulders-Waucquez (dus …cuyers Waucquez) (1908–2010)
Painting by: Leo van Eekelen, 1942 – oil on canvas. Bruikleen: Mr Maggie Hylkema –
Smulders (Naarden). Medal Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice (Holy See)
53

Boulevard Militaire 144, Brussels, my mother’s birthplace
Avenue de Tervueren 245, Brussels. The house where my mother grew up and where my
brother Francis was born
54

My old nanny, Mies Schoof with Seven’s daughter Pauline,
my goddaughter, in her retirement home
We were all mainly educated by a nanny (Mies Schoof); by my mother from a
distance; and by the Jesuits. My mother closely watched our behaviour and school
grades, reporting, I suppose, to my father as required. He was the disciplinarian, and
on the right – or should I say wrong – occasions I was made to feel the back of his
slipper ravaging my bare bottom.
As he came home very late during the week, I saw my parents together mostly on
Sunday nights, when we had dinner with them in our official dining room, decorated
by my father’s favourite Old Master paintings (I may have inherited my hobby for
the Arts later in life from him). These were usually rather solemn occasions, always
without the nanny.
Already, as a young kid, I wanted people to like me, and for whatever reason, I was
the nanny’s favourite, which is still a source of humour and envy for my brothers
today. I was very fond of her, too, visiting her regularly at her retirement home, in
her later in life, until she passed away in 1997. I was like an adopted child to her;
being her favourite, I enjoyed many advantages over my brothers, such as being the
only one who was allowed to stay in her room after dinner (I “sucked up to her”
55

they would sneer). My mother passionately wanted one of her seven sons to become
a priest, and at the age of seven or eight, I told her I wanted to become one (to the
great annoyance of my other brothers who thought I was a hypocrite). It got me a
considerable amount of additional motherly love and care. However, around my 15th
birthday she realised that I did not have a priestly fibre within me. This need for
other people to like me stayed with me my whole life. It is something I have also tried
to instil into my children, because life is so much more pleasant with many friends.
Around 1940, we moved to one of Holland’s nicest towns, Wassenaar, where we
stayed during the war years.
I was always fascinated by fishing, and when I was six years old, I stumbled upon a
large house with a huge pond full of goldfish. I walked around and asked a German
soldier who was guarding the house if I could catch some fish in the pond, not
realising that this was the local headquarters of the SS (the German occupiers –
Secret Service – of Holland). A little while later, I came home triumphantly with a
large goldfish and proudly told my father I had caught it in the local canal. He, of
course, did not believe me and asked me where I had caught the fish. I showed him
the SS headquarters. Very quickly, the fish miraculously disappeared, and I had five
days’ house arrest.
Some months later, I was walking through the local park when I found a fallen-down
wooden signpost on the grass. This was 1943 and there was a huge lack of any kind
of fuel, so I naturally picked it up and, while proudly singing Heil Hi Ho (a popular
German tune on the radio), dragged the pole behind me to our house, not realising
that it had Verboten für Juden, meaning ‘Forbidden for Jews’, written on it: Jewish
people were not allowed to walk in the park!
When my father saw me approaching the house with that sign, he raced out and took
it from me, his face angry and upset. He disappeared behind the house with the sign,
knowing that he would have been arrested by the Germans for sure if they had found
him with it. This was not talked about again until much later, with total silence on
this subject during the war. My mother told me that within one hour he had hacked
the sign into little pieces, which were then burnt in the wood fire in the kitchen.
In spring 1943 the Germans were moving their rocket launchers all over town (the
London Blitzkrieg) to hide them from the RAF, so Wassenaar became too dangerous,
and we moved to my grandmother’s house in the Banka straat in The Hague. This
was a large patrician house with plenty of room for us all. My grandmother (the wife
of Frans) was a wonderful, beautiful, and affectionate lady born into one of the oldest
patrician families (Reichlin von Schwyz) in Schwyz, one of the oldest Kantons in
56

Switzerland. She called herself Eine Urschweitzerin. Her family had lived there for ages
and owned a whole mountain called de Birre. She moved to Holland after she had
met my grandfather in Gstaad, where they were both skiing.
My grandmother Marie Louise Smulders, neé Reichlin von Schwyz 1885–1972.
Oil by Thérèse Schwartze
57

I vividly remember one morning after breakfast, when the Germans were combing
all the houses searching for young men to work in their war industries. I did not
know it at the time, but my grandmother was hiding two of her sons (my uncles
Lou and Frido) in the attic. They were in the Dutch resistance, thus arch enemies
of the Germans. If they had been found, they would have certainly been tortured
and liquidated. When the doorbell rang, she opened the door to face two German
officers, and what happened next I will never forget: In Hochdeutsch, she addressed
the two officers (who were in hindsight very decent guys) as follows, “We Swiss,
looked after your children after the First World War. How dare you now come into
my house to look for my children.” The two officers first looked surprised, then
saluted and went to the next house. I witnessed the whole scene and believe that this
event instilled an attitude in me to take no shit from anyone. This served me well in
later life.
My father and my grandmother (much, much later)
58

Another vivid memory I have is from after the war ended in 1945, when the
British parachuted food packages (Operation Manna) over our town, as Holland
was experiencing a terrible hunger crisis. At one time a food package landed at the
wrong place, in the middle of a minefield close to our house. I can still see me
there, together with a large crowd, standing behind the fence surrounding the field;
nobody dared to go and fetch the food packages. Suddenly, in absolute silence, a
woman, poorly dressed and emaciated, went into the field, bare footed, to pick up
the food. I can still see her tiptoeing, under the deep silence of the crowd. When
she returned safely, after some 10 or 15 minutes, everybody cheered and applauded.
Another lesson: go where others don’t dare to go; risks provide unexpected chances;
follow your instincts.
Me with my goat in the pasture that later
became a minefield, circa 1941
Me, aged eight or nine
Life passed quietly, with its ups and downs; I was an enquiring and adventurous
young boy. When I was eight or nine, I climbed trees to collect birds’ eggs, which of
course would be illegal now. I spent one night in the police station when I was caught
climbing trees in a public park, which was forbidden. So, my father asked the serving
officer to keep me overnight in the cell to teach me a lesson, because he thought this
discipline would do me good. Indeed, I learnt my lesson. I also remember I scratched
59

my name on the wall along with many other local rascals. I would like to go back to
see if it is still there…
Once, when roaming parks and bushes for birds and eggs, I found a young heron
under a tree, which I proudly showed to my father. Unfortunately, the bird decided
to shit on his shoes, which made him more than unhappy, to say the least. This love
for nature has never left me. The nanny was very fond of birds as well, so we had a
shared hobby, and in our attic she bred canaries. This was a great source of irritation
for my parents, but to me it was wonderful. For this, and some other reasons that
I did not understand, she was finally fired when I was around 10, which nearly broke
my heart. Birds remain my hobby to this day, and in nearly all my adult life I have
had an aviary; even now I have a very big one in Phuket (6x18m).
My memories from Schiedam are somewhat vague, but I do remember it was the
foremost city in the world for Genever factories. All the big brands had, and still have,
operations there. When I was around 10 years old, my first love was the daughter
of a well-known Genever maker called Mieke Nolet. She was, however, not socially
acceptable to my parents. I later realised this was a silly attitude, as her family became
world leaders with their Ketel Vodka brand and one of the wealthiest families in
Holland. I still drink a lot of Ketel Vodka (wherever I can find it) in her memory
although now she must now be in her eighties as well.
The house where we grew up in the postwar years. Tuinlaan 12, Schiedam
60

Probably because I was too unruly, I was sent to a local boarding school called St
Jozeph, in Zeist at 10 years old. I hated nearly everything about it, especially the
lack of privacy in having to sleep in one large space shared by 30 to 40 other boys.
I misbehaved and disregarded the rules, and as a result, spent a lot of time in
punishment either helping the cleaning staff or in the kitchens washing the dishes.
Fortunately, I only had to stay two years there as I was fairly miserable. I was
subsequently sent to a much nicer boarding school run by Jesuits called De Breul,
also in Zeist. This was the best Catholic boarding school in Holland, where my
grandfather, father and all of my brothers were also educated. There, I opted for a
classical education and learnt Greek, Latin, German, French and English between
the ages of 12 and 18 years old. I also learnt Italian (I spent three summer months at
the Università de Studiare Italiano di Perugia), Spanish (three months at a Spanish
school in Málaga), Malay and later, Japanese. It’s no wonder that when I was employed
at the Shell company 10 years later, they considered me to be a language wizard.
In my third year, when I was 15, I was kicked out of school for three days. I got off
lightly, but three of my friends were sent home for good. The reason for this was
that one of my classmates had found an old German field gun and had brought it to
school hidden in his suitcase. At night, dressed in bedsheets to make us invisible in
the snow, we would go out and try to shoot rabbits or a swan in the school’s pond.
One night, during the evening chapel, which we were supposed to attend, we were
out in the school grounds, hunting. The priests of course heard the bang! bang!
bang! and raced on their bikes through the school grounds to find out what had
happened. To cut a long story short, they found a dead swan and raised a big alarm,
and at 11pm, in the bitter cold, they called a general assembly of all 500 pupils. As
nobody would come forward, the head of the school, Father Smit, warned us that
the culprits, unless they repented, would be expelled from the school. He gave us 12
hours, until 11am the next day, to come forward. I told my friends to go to confession,
but they refused considering this hypocritical. That night, in my pyjamas, I knocked
on Father Smit’s door and asked for confession, knowing full well that the holy duty
from a confession meant what I told him would also be a holy secret he could never
disclose. Later, it was discovered who else was involved (not from me!) and my friends
were expelled. They should have listened to me!
Of course, everyone wanted to be on a good footing with the priests, who were our
superiors. I found a great solution by making Father X my confessor. He was head of
the school and the Latin and Greek teacher as well, quite an old man who even my
father had used as his confessor during his own days at school.
61

Every week during obligatory confession, I was asked to sit on his knee in the rectory.
He was ‘friendly’, and always put his right hand in my back pocket (and that was all!!).
To this day my right bum cheek seems to be the more sensitive of the two.
After each confession, for penance, he would give me a number of pages from our
Latin and Greek study books, which – surprise, surprise – were also the subject of
tests in class the following week. I would by then know the text by heart. It’s no
wonder that, to the envy of my classmates, I graduated summa cum laude in Latin and
Greek. Talk about corruption in the Church.
I was always fascinated by girls (this may be due to lack of motherly embraces and
boarding school at an early an age?) and I lost my virginity in de Houtstraat in The
Hague (the red-light district) at the age of 16, when I occasionally stayed with my
grandmother who lived in that town. Using my pocket money and her ice cream
money, I had an early lesson in the joys of investing wisely and astutely…
After that, my fascination with girls was explosively increased when my father allowed
me (at 16 years old) to go on a five-week Mediterranean boat trip, (a refrigerator
vessel, commonly known as a reefer ship, built by the Werf Gusto) with Tineke,
the 17-year-old daughter of the owner, and two of her girlfriends. We had adjoining
cabins and all three were so bored that they all started to fancy me (I still remember
the other two girls’ names: Yoko and Ingrid). To say that I was truly introduced to
female affection at a very tender age and trained in amorous endurance is certainly
an understatement, but the positive effects have stayed with me throughout my life.
Tineke lived some 15 minutes by bicycle from my boarding school so I could pay her
a visit on nearly every free day. One time, when we were in the tennis changing room
together, I suddenly saw the face of her younger brother Jan (RIP) staring through
the misted-up window. I knew that the little rat would report all he saw to his father,
so needless to say I was out of there like a rocket, running like a hare with whatever
clothes I could grab under my arm; her father was very conservative and strict. From
that moment I was less than welcome in Tineke’s house. That was the end of my first
relationship. Another consequence of this sad breakup was that I suddenly stopped
mentioning her in my weekly confessions and my confessor asked me what happened
and wanted all the details. I think I told him enough to give him the Sin of Desire
which has to be confessed, as naughty desires are a deadly sin for which you can go
to Hell. Long live my Catholic Jesuit education.
62

My father Henri Smulders at my son Alexander’s wedding
My father bought a small five-metre sailing yawl which we sailed during our holidays
at a lake near our house, Kralingse Plassen – always with a girlfriend of course.
The lake was surrounded by vast fields of reeds and most of the time was spent not
actually sailing, but mooring our boat out of sight in the reeds (which was called riet
zeilen, amongst our friends). What made this thing even more adventurous was the
fact that the water police were always ready to arrest you if you were found alone
and unmarried with a girl in the reeds. With the sail down covering the boat it was
a pleasant and comfortable place for mischief. The problem was that on returning
to the local yacht club there was sometimes a great deal of difficulty erasing the
creases on the sail, to the great hilarity of my buddies; oh wonderful, careless youth!
Obviously, it was here that I acquired my lifelong passion for sailing. For my friends
who did not have sailing yawls, and therefore had no riet zeilen opportunities, they
would make out with their girlfriends on the side of the plentiful dykes in Holland,
while out of vision from others. This could explain why many Dutch girls walk with
their heels wide because they had to anchor them into the side of the dyke to prevent
them sliding into the water below?
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My father Henri Smulders, (1908–1997) Kees Verkade 1986, Brons,
Erven Mr Maurice Smulders van Vijfhoeven
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My mother, Dame Marguerite Smulders-Waucquez, 2002
65

CHAPTER TWO
University Years
From the ages of 18 to 23, I attended university in Rotterdam, the Netherlands
School of Economics (now renamed Erasmus School of Economics). This was
and still is the leading business university in Holland, with two Nobel prize winners
as professors.
University life in Holland was generally very pleasant, and, like everything else in
Dutch society, status was very important. It was essential to join a fraternity (called
Corps), which consisted of the most elite students. My fraternity was called The
Council of 11, and to this day I still have a regular connection with the surviving
ones (from the 11 there are seven still active in 2020). This membership requirement
was so important socially, that my father insisted he would not pay my university fees
– or for any of my brothers’ studies – unless we were Corps members.
Within the Corps, I practised all kinds of sports such as rowing, boxing, hockey,
etc. In the team sports, we would regularly compete with teams from other Corps
in other universities. Besides studying and sports, there was a lot of emphasis on
socialising, with a big drinking culture at the centre. We would drink with each other
until late hours most days of the week. I was very good at yoga at the time, and, on
one drunken night, I decided to do a head stand on the bar. Of course, I fell right
into a number of beer glasses, which resulted in an ambulance trip to the hospital for
some serious stitches on my bum… this helped my reputation in the Corps!
During my first year I did not have enough money for a car, so I bought a motorbike
– a 500cc Jawa Brand. This was a powerful machine and filled me with a lot of pride.
When my parents invited all of their sons on a family holiday to Sardinia, I decided
to join them, travelling by motorbike all the way from Holland! The ride to Sardinia
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took one week and was quite uneventful, however, on the way back, while travelling
through the north of Italy, I must have fallen asleep because I hit the back of a truck
at high speed. Two or three days later I woke up in a local hospital – Hospital Distrital
de Ticino – and found myself with severe head injuries, a triple broken jaw, broken
nose and other fractures. The hospital was not equipped for full-scale surgery, so, as
I could not be transported to a better place, my parents gave the hospital permission
to do all medical work with local anaesthetic. Sometimes the pain was so intense that
I passed out. I understand now how all the saints in the Catholic Church could resist
the Inquisition: I presume they also passed out as pain, like anything else, has a limit.
I still walk around with a silver jaw, a cow bone in my nose and five artificial front
teeth (my real ones were found by the truck driver stuck into the back of his truck
which he later, sweetly, brought to the hospital hoping in vain they could possibly
be reused.) However, after two months I was fully recovered and could take up my
student life again.
During my second year of studies, a world-famous swimmer from Switzerland called
Louis Lourmais swam the Rhine river non-stop from Switzerland to Rotterdam,
with great publicity as this had never been attempted before. One drunken night,
I made a bet with my friends that I could jump into the Rhine one mile ahead of
his arrival and be received as a hero by the assembled press and crowds. I hired a
frog suit and from a little motorboat with my friends on board, I jumped into the
ice-cold Rhine. I nearly drowned, but I did succeed in impersonating Lourmais upon
arrival. The ruse was of course discovered, but everybody saw the joke in me trying
to impersonate Lourmais and there was ample press coverage. The following, is an
article from the front page of the Telegraaf, which freely translated reads as follows:
LOUIS LOURMAIS MAKES WORLD RECORD – VALIDATED BY THE
GUINNESS BOOK OF RECORDS
The arrival in Rotterdam had been made into a great show by the organisers. Ship
sirens were whistling when the Frenchman arrived at the harbour pier. Lourmais was
accompanied by, in ‘v’ form, a swimming group of 16 Dutch divers. There was a platform
on the pier with a large banner “WEEST WELKOM LOUIS”. Some gentlemen gave
some speeches and Cocky Gastelaar (a world famous Dutch former swimmer who twice
improved the world record in the women’s 100-metre freestyle in 1956) offered him a huge
flower bouquet whilst the swimmer was shivering from the cold, waiting to get out of his
frog suit into a warm bath. Before the arrival there had been a considerable commotion
within the waiting public, police and firemen. A pseudo frogman had arrived a bit earlier
in similar dive suit, a student called Eric Smulders [yours truly], who intended, with his
fellow students, to be honoured for his achievement [as an impersonator] on the podium
by arriving first and receiving the flowers and welcome kiss from Cocky!
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When it was discovered that I was an imposter, the police could not appreciate the
joke, grabbed me, and forcefully removed me from the podium. Later, they saw the
funny side and did not arrest me.
Preparing for the arrival of Louis Lourmais – imposter!
One night in my second year, during the very rough initiation month for the new
students (feuten), there was construction work going on in the main bar, and there was
a lot of liquid concrete lying around. Everyone was drunk and we decided to round
up all the novices (feuten) and build a wall using them. We lay them on top of one
another and every layer was secured with concrete. This was a lot of fun, but not for
the novices, especially those lying on the bottom. Finally, reaching nearly 1.5m high,
the wall collapsed, as the building blocks (i.e. the lying down bodies) were showing
signs of serious stress. A number of ambulances were required to take them to the
hospital for treatment. The press, of course, got wind of this and blew the whole
thing up as a huge scandal committed by rich kids. The government got involved, the
Corps house was closed for a month and strict guidelines were introduced to prevent
this from happening again.
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During this time, I got to know my first wife, Marijke Fens, the only daughter of
a successful Dutch entrepreneur, who accompanied me to all the Corps festivities
during my studies. She herself was studying to be a medical doctor and, between the
two of us, we had enough money to have a good time and travel around Europe. I was
forbidden to ride a motorcycle again after the accident, so I bought (it was all I could
afford at that time) a tiny car called a Messerschmitt, with a 30hp engine, which
was so light that it could be lifted up by two people. It was made in Germany as a
predecessor to the Citroën 2CV, which I bought in my third year. The Messerschmitt
was finally destroyed when I used a crane to lift it to the second floor of our Corps
House so that I could drive it around the bar; later the car had to be disassembled to
get it out again, but I never found the time nor money to put the thing back together
(a number of parts were missing anyway).
Student time was a lot of fun for me, but I also had the drive to succeed and compete
with my brothers. When I went home for the weekend with my dirty laundry, my
mother would always say, “I don’t care about your student fun, what are your grades
and when do you graduate?”
Marijke Fens. My first wife, Alexander and Patrick’s mother
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With Marijke and my Messerschmit
Marijke’s father Mr JAL Fens, entrepreneur
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Marijke’s mother, Mrs Fens, Oma Fens with her two grandchildren Alex and Patrick
I was also a part-time night watch at a dubious hotel called Casa Blanca, well known
for its short time ‘rentals’. In those days, unmarried couples were forbidden to
book a room and I made good money declaring them ‘temporarily married’ for a
substantial fee!
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CHAPTER THREE
Young Adulthood and My Early Career
1961–1962
In June 1961, I graduated from university with a cum laude master’s degree, having
completed my degree within five years; although, I must admit that I took the
easiest courses and many shortcuts, including a thesis that was ‘creatively’ rewritten
with the help of an old manuscript called The history of Swiss trading companies in the
world (what a coincidence that I joined a Swiss trading company later in my life).
With Marijke on our wedding day
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In July of that year I married Marijke and for our honeymoon we went to the US on
the SS Amsterdam. The marriage was a formal affair with Marijke in a white bridal
gown and the Bishop of Rotterdam officiating the Mass. In hindsight, we were too
young to handle the seductions of expatriate life that were to come.
I applied to several American universities to continue my studies, and with my top
grades was accepted with a full study grant at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh,
not realising that this was one of the top technical schools in America. We left for
the US in July of that year.
I stayed at Carnegie for only three months, as I was asked to write a paper on
differential equations, which I knew nothing at all about, having studied only
the simplest of courses before graduation. This was my first real failure. I called
my father and said, “This university is not for me, but can you help me with a job
in America?”
At that time, Werf Gusto shipyard was working with one of the largest
earthmoving companies in America: The Thew Shovel Company and I was ‘lucky’
(Daddy always helped when asked, thank you!) to be accepted as a trainee almost
immediately. We moved from Pittsburgh to Lorain, Ohio, in January 1962, and
I became an export clerk for the company. My job included selling spare parts,
filling in quotations, etc. I found the work boring, except for learning to operate
tractors and mobile cranes.
I was living with Marijke above what I later found out was a funeral parlour, where
corpses were embalmed, but the rent was very low. In addition to my job in Lorain,
I had two consecutive moonlighting jobs, both from which I was fired. The first
one was a night-time job selling cooking ware, house-to-house, in the evenings.
I had to buy the whole set of very pricey demonstration pans in advance, which
was the trick, of course. I accidentally set fire to one of the cooking pots during a
home demonstration (home-to-home sales called ‘cold calling’) and was fired. To my
chagrin, I not only had lost my job but also my investment in the cooking ware set
which was substantial considering the little money I had at that time.
A short time later, I got a job at McDonald’s, working from 6pm to midnight,
filling up milkshake cups. There were five machines and a cup would take 30
seconds to fill, so, by the time I got to the fifth one, the first one was ready and had
to be removed. I had to be on the ball all the time, but one night I was distracted,
maybe by a pretty customer, and, before I knew it, every milkshake on the machine
exploded, with ice cream covering the ceiling. Needless to say, I got fired for the
second time.
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The next year, Marijke became pregnant with Alexander, my first son. By this time,
I knew every spare part of every crane the company built and had a machine operating
licence, which allowed me to operate a tractor and mobile cranes.
For my further training Thew found me a sales job with their Belgian distributor
Almacoa, in Brussels. We moved back to Europe and every morning I got up at 5am
to drive my company car, a 2CV (the cheapest car on the market but fun, with a
folding roof), to various potential clients all over Belgium. Whilst most of my friends,
including my brothers, had jobs in their family companies, I was ploughing around
Belgium trying to sell tractors to farmers and contractors, and I started to feel that
I was not succeeding in life, and that felt terrible. Whatever I did and however much
I talked, I did not get any orders for three months. At Easter, on Good Friday, I had
to go to a beach resort in Belgium called Knokke, where a contractor had just won a
huge contract to build a new pier. The contractor – I still remember his name as Jan
de Nul – told me that he needed the biggest crane that could be produced. This was,
of course, exciting news, as Thew built one of the largest mobile cranes in the world,
which would suit his needs and would make me the most successful salesman in the
company, worldwide.
Mr de Nul requested for me to come back the next day, Easter Saturday, to make a
presentation and quotation. As I had asked my wife Marijke to go to Paris for the
Easter weekend, I told him I would come back the next Tuesday. When I did arrive
at his doorstep that Tuesday, he told me, “Sorry, but on Saturday the salesman
from P&H (my biggest competitor) came by, and I bought a crane from them on
Sunday night.”
This was the largest crane ever sold in Europe, and I missed out on a commission of
$17,000: two times my yearly salary. To say I was disillusioned is an understatement,
but it taught me a lesson for life: when an opportunity presents itself, you either go
and jump on it immediately, or you might miss the chance of a lifetime.
During this time my first son Alexander was born in Brussels on 20th February
1963.
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Alexander is born. Marijke and me, the proud parents, with Alexander
Never selling anything did not do my standing in Almacoa much good, and after
eight months on the job I was fired; by then I had also crashed three company cars.
The first two were because I had fallen asleep, and the last one was because I had
seen a pretty girl walking down the street. I was distracted, and, before I knew it,
I banged into a row of cars in front of me, damaging three or four of them. I still
remember the look on my boss’s face when I returned the busted-up car to the office.
All of this did little to improve my inferiority complex towards my brothers and
friends, to say the least. At that time my brother Robert was already deputy managing
director of the family business Werf Gusto, with 2,000-plus employees. Not many
years later he was sitting under the huge portrait of my great-grandfather (AF) as
CEO, whilst I was sitting in a smashed-up car somewhere in Belgium about to get
fired for the third time at the age of 25.
I called my father again and he helped me get a job as an export manager of a
joint venture between the Werf Gusto and Thew Shovel Company in Apeldoorn,
Holland, where they were assembling Thew cranes under franchise. So, in around
May 1963, Marijke, Alex and I moved to Apeldoorn, a small, uninteresting town in
the east of Holland.
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My boss – the very young CEO of Werf Gusto and founder of SBM,
‘Single Buoy Moorings’ – my brother Robert
I had to live in a very small working-class apartment in Apeldoorn with my wife and
my new son, Alex, which did not make me feel very proud in the company of my
other brothers or my contemporaries; it did not fit with my grand visions for my life.
My brother Robert was head of the company for which I was working, and I drove
a 2CV, which was the cheapest car in existence at the time and he, of course, drove
a large company car. I did feel like I was failing, and it was a feeling that I could
not shake off. My brother Francis was already an accomplished eye surgeon, Robert
was deputy managing director at Gusto and my brother Maurice was working for
an important client of Werf Gusto. This was a successful Dutch shipowner, Jan
Dammers, who would go on to become one of the foremost ship owners in Holland
(Dammers and van der Heide) and whose only son was... Jan Dammers Jr. (the boy
who ratted on me at school).
After one month on the job I was sent on a sales job to Iceland and after two days
there, an airport strike broke out which kept me locked up in Reykjavik for four
weeks, fully paid and staying in a wonderful hotel (Grand Hotel Reykjavik – indirectly
paid for by my boss/brother, Robert!). The strike was in protest at the closure of US
army air bases in the country. Poor Marijke, in the meantime, stayed in Apeldoorn
in our ‘council’ flat with Alex, but all I can say was that this was force majeure.
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A peculiarity about Iceland at this time was that there were nearly no men on the
island as they were all out fishing, so there was a large population of eager local
females looking for something to do in their spare time. The huge thermal baths in
the open air were especially great (nude) meeting places and allowed me to acquire a
basic knowledge of the Icelandic language in addition to my other languages.
After about one year I became bored with my job and applied to Shell International
Petroleum Company in London for an expat job in marketing.
Robert Smulders MSc (1933 – ) My brother Robert – at a much later age, still good-looking
and very distinctive (please note the slide rule in his hand, of which he was very proud as
there were no computers at this time). Portrait by Urban Larsson
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CHAPTER FOUR
Shell 1964–1972 and the Start of
My Life in Japan
With perfect references and still very young, I was quickly accepted by Shell and
sent to London for a three-month training course with about 50 other lucky
candidates (I am still friends with some of them). I mentioned earlier the importance
of being a member of the student Corps – well, this was the first question on the
Shell interview form and read as follows: Were you a member of the Corps in your
university and if not, why not? Nowadays, a question like that would be politically
unacceptable.
Whilst I was learning all about oil refineries and oil marketing in London, Marijke
and Alex stayed in Holland (still in Apeldoorn). After three months, everyone in
the class received an envelope telling them where they would be going next, and
I was assigned to Singapore, to be the retail manager of their gas stations there.
I moved there with Marijke and Alex. On arrival we were picked up in a Shell-owned
limousine by a driver wearing a white uniform with gold buttons. We were given a
very posh house with three servants, our first company house. When I left for work
the next day, Ninah the amah (servant) knelt at my feet, frantically polishing my shoes
and saying to me, “Sir must never leave with dirty shoes for work.” My immediate
reaction was to think: what on earth have I been doing in Europe all my life? As a
result of this first experience, I spent the rest of my career in several jobs in the Far
East and never ended up in Europe again.
Getting a licence from Shell to operate a Shell petrol station was a licence to print
money for the operator, and I was responsible for giving out those licences to locals.
There was so much competition amongst local entrepreneurs to get a licence (and
keep it, as I could fire them) that they would lavish attention on me by regularly
inviting me into their bars and restaurants. Sometimes I was offered a box of money,
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which was put in front of my door, but I would pass this straight on to Shell out of
principle, of course, but also because had I been caught accepting these seductions,
I would probably have gone to jail and surely been fired.
Singapore – Handing over the keys for a Shell petrol station franchise.
My friend and salesman Queck Ki Kie is on the left of this picture
Singapore was bombed several times by Indonesia around this time, but I never
really saw any of this, and it did not bother me while I was there except occasionally
having to go to bomb shelters (which was kind of exciting and often ended in a
big party). Indonesia (recently freed from Dutch domination) was opposed to the
formation of Malaysia and the new Singapore state (led by the famous leader Lee
Kwan Yew) and got involved in a conflict with the Malays. This stemmed from
the creation of the Malaysian state and disputes over ownership of the land and
borders. Through all this we continued to live our expatriate life very happily – at
least I did.
I was in Singapore for about 12 months, and, whilst there, my second son Patrick
was born on 3rd July 1965. I had a 10-staff marketing team working for me and
I remember one of them, a salesman, was a Chinese man called Queck Ki Kie.
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He had four wives (following Chinese tradition). He confided in me that this was
actually very hard: they would gang up on him when he came home late, which
he often did. Also, he could never get one a better present than the other; he
always had to consider the feelings of four women rather than just one. Contrary
to common belief (including mine) he was actually pretty miserable. His oldest wife
had the right to select the next ones and any intimacy with a younger one had to
be preceded by honouring his first wife first. As in the rest of life, all that glitters
is not gold.
Part of my job was to keep contact with the local Sultan of Johor Baru, who had
around 100 wives. He was a rather notorious character who actually shot a caddy (in
the leg) on his own golf course when the caddy could not find his golf ball. As he
was the absolute ruler he could not be prosecuted. I became rather friendly with him
(and even played golf with him on occasion) but I never wanted to sell anything to
the Sultan, because he would – in principle – not pay his bills. Ever!
Life was wonderful in Asia because I was living the lifestyle I had dreamed of. Shell
was very profitable in those days and I was very well paid. I loved this life, but I am
not sure Marijke was too happy with me being out five nights each week, though she
had her own party life and friends. I suppose this contributed to the later breakdown
of our marriage.
After about a year, we were moved to Malaysia where I became gas manager (LPG)
for a very large area which included Borneo, Sabah and Sarawak. I was in charge of
selling the gas bottles to the local population. The canisters were very expensive and
would often disappear; the locals would cut them in half and use them as cooking
pans. Unfortunately, several customers were blown up while attempting this, because
there was still gas left in the canister. We were often sued – this added both spice and
legal experience to my job.
These were very interesting times. I regularly travelled to Borneo, Brunei, Sabah
and Sarawak. Shell had a refinery in Malaysia and were the market leader of the
oil industry in this part of the world. If you were Asian and worked as a manager
for Shell, you would usually get a lucrative job in the government later on. For
me, as a young man, this was a very prestigious company to work for. Of course,
I loved this.
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Marijke partying in Malaysia
With Marijke. “Happy times” in Spain
82

In happy times, long ago, Marijke, Eric, Alexander and Patrick on the way to Malaysia
With Marijke and the boys at the beach
83

Marijke, Alex and Patrick at Christmas time
Bed time once again
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I have always been interested in languages and there used to be a Malay national
language competition for the foreigners to see who could make the best speech in
Malay. I participated and nearly won (I got second prize)! This was the reason that
I was later considered a language wizard and sent by Shell to the Asian Language
School at the University of Sheffield in England to learn Japanese.
We had a wonderful colonial house, fully staffed, in the best area of Kuala Lumpur
and were really spoiled with many parties and servants. I owned a blue sports car
(I have always had a slightly ostentatious side) but this was not appreciated by my
superiors in London. Once, I was told off for lacking respect for authority: when
my English boss came into my office I did not stand up to greet him (I actually had
my legs on my desk as it was after working hours). I have always disliked authority
anyway. On the whole, the Dutch are not as good with etiquette as the English.
I particularly remember one occasion when Robert was visiting me on a business
trip for Werf Gusto. We were swimming in my tiny pool and I asked him how much
he made, and he told me that not only did he make five or six times more than me,
but he also had a company car and travelled first class. I nearly had a heart attack
and could have drowned in the pool had he not helped me out. Whatever mental
security I had was instantly destroyed, but it did convince me I had to do even better
one way or the other, so thanks Robert!
I was once invited to dinner by the Sultan of Brunei. There were around 1,000
people surrounded by hundreds of his concubines at this formal banquet; lucky man
he was (or not?). On this occasion, Marijke had accompanied me, although we were
starting to drift apart by this stage, as we otherwise spent little time together due to
my travelling and partying.
Sometime later, I was selected as one of two Dutchmen and two Englishmen – all
young graduates – to go to the Asian Language School in Sheffield to study Japanese
(I was later supposed to play a top role in Shell Japan). Marijke moved with me
again, and we lived in a semi-detached, typically English, middle-class house with a
view over the moors; quite different to our fully staffed mansions in Malaysia and
Singapore. Instead of lavish parties our only outings were eating Yorkshire pudding
on Sunday afternoons with our neighbours. The rest of the time I studied Japanese
and Japanese script for what felt like day and night. No wonder Marijke was bored
there. While in England the inevitable happened: we split up.
After a lot of wrangling (with the help of my father – unfairly in hindsight – using
his contacts in the legal world) our two children were assigned to me as principal
caregiver (there was no co-parenting system at that time). Of course, this caused huge
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grief to my ex-wife (and my children, who naturally missed their mother) and should
never had happened, but the past cannot be changed. As I was now alone with Alex
and Patrick, I asked my brother Maurice to help me out till I found a suitable nanny.
Maurice (RIP) lived in a large house in Brasschaat, Belgium, which was an ideal place
to live for a Dutchman who did not want to pay Dutch taxes. He and his wife, Nicole
(RIP), lovingly cared for my two children along with their own kids for around nine
months, while I continued my Japanese studies in Sheffield. Although the boys have
fond memories of their stay, it must have been a traumatic and psychologically very
difficult time for them.
After nearly a year in Sheffield, I graduated in more-or-less fluent spoken and written
Japanese (2,000 characters plus, with each two or three readings, kun yomi and on
yomi) and Shell sent all four graduates to Shell Sekiyu in Tokyo.
With my brother Maurice (RIP) on board his yacht – De Maas Yacht Club, Rotterdam 2014
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Bronze bust of Maurice in his family memorial garden. Bronze by Carla Rutgers
Maurice’s wonderful wife, Nicole (RIP)
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Nicole
Going to school in Belgium with Maurice and Nicole’s daughters, 1969.
From left: Mireille, Alex, Ondine and Patrick
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In the meantime, after many interviews for a nanny for the children, I found one
who impressed me and I thought was very suitable.
Arriving in Japan with Mrs June, Alex and Patrick
Her name was June van Heerden (we called her Mrs June). She was in her early forties,
twice divorced, and prided herself on having been the first professional female white
hunter in South Africa. We picked up Alexander and Patrick from my brother’s
house and travelled to Japan. Both of my children loved Mrs June’s hunting stories
and pictures of slain game. In Yokohama, where we lived, she became known as
Mrs Gin because she copiously consumed gin and tonics. We had a beautiful antique
Japanese house on the Bluff, which has since become a famous Japanese restaurant,
near the Gaijin Bochi cemetery. The ground floor was a wonderful tatami room
which served as my bedroom and was next to the staircase leading to the children’s
rooms upstairs. Life was very pleasant with ample room for local romances (young,
single foreigners were difficult to find and very much in favour with Japanese ladies).
You see, based on stories about the GIs who were in Japan for many years after 1946,
Caucasians were rumoured to have the ‘largest equipment’ for amorous activities.
Often, when I was standing in a bus or a train, I overheard small talk from Japanese
ladies saying something like “Omotte iru ano gaijin totemo okii desu ka?” (“Do you think
that foreigner has a very big one too?”) I would reply to their great embarrassment:
“Boku no wah totemo okii desu yo.” (“Mine is gigantic, also.”)
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Alex and Patrick in my tatami bedroom (with the famous paper doors) with our
beloved Sachiko
My early years in the Far East – my Japanese dancing lessons
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During my time there I had become good friends with another Dutch student named
Maarten van den Bergh, who, 20 years later, would become the managing director of
Shell worldwide. He was remarkably successful at Shell; I wasn’t!
Maarten van den Bergh, President of Royal Dutch Petroleum Company, 1998–2000
As a bachelor, there were enough opportunities for extraneous activities. My bedroom
(the tatami room on the ground floor) had rice paper doors and this was where I passed
my nights, not always alone, especially not on weekends, when I usually came home late
from a local disco. Much later I learnt that Alex and Patrick spent many hours on the
staircase at night, next to my bedroom, enjoying the noisy antics which emanated through
the paper doors. Surely, this first-hand learning was superior to a sex education in class?
In addition to this first-hand schooling, my mother had always impressed the importance
of education upon me, so I ensured my own children went to the best schools.
They became very close to our Japanese head of house, Sachiko, who we had to
leave in Japan after I was transferred to Ethiopia/London (to their great chagrin,
and another traumatic event in their early lives). Later, after my marriage to Anne
Marie, Mrs June retired and many years later found a new husband in New Zealand.
I visited her only once, years later, and bought her 12 extra-large bottles of Gordon’s
gin, which she loved.
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During my stay in Japan, I met three wonderful entrepreneurs who are still amongst
my best friends. The three of them, George Worthington, Anthony Willoughby
and Robert White had started their own businesses and I became a minority
shareholder in all three businesses (my old moonlighting habits from my time
in the US resurfaced?). After hours, I would advise them and help them out. At
one time George and Anthony had started a company called Royal Windsor and
sold beautifully packaged sets of gold-plated pens and lighters (copies of Parker
and Dunhill) via a door-to-door sales company and business boomed. We made
so much money that the Yakuza (Japanese mafia) got wind of this and started
threatening us. In the end we had to give up as messing with the Yakuza is no
joke, and after a year they forced us out with barely feigned physical threats for
about 10% of the real value. George, being very creative, then set up an escort
service ESL (Executive Services Limited) to guide foreign visitors through the
intricacies of Japanese tourist sites around Tokyo. The guides were specially selected
beautiful Caucasian ladies (I was lucky to be on the selection committee), mostly
students and teachers, etc. and prospective clients could choose from an extensive
picture portfolio of the ‘well-trained’ beautiful guides. However, their services
soon extended far beyond usual guide working time (after 6pm). After a year of
rapid and profitable growth (with especially Anthony enjoying the inherent perks
of this type of business), the Tokyo police decided that this was not an appropriate
‘activity’ and we had to close down (fortunately my participation was secret). The
GM of ESL was an American lady called Mary with whom Anthony had become
romantically involved.
As a true Englishman he fancied only ample-bosomed Caucasian ladies. This left
him with relatively little choice except to (ab)use the ESL foreign staff pool – despite
the fact that the local ladies’ pond contained abundant, as the Japanese called it,
gaijin (foreigner) sushi.
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George Worthington opening his Louis Quatorze boutique
Former Miss Hong Kong – Michelle Reis modelling an LQ handbag –
Hong Kong airport, 2007
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George with Mary, MD of ESL at the opening (and later) Tony’s “squeeze”
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I sold my shares back to George (much too early to my regret – very much below their
worth; the story of my life), who then started a company similar to his tarnished brand
Royal Windsor, called Louis Quatorze (with a ‘paper’ address on the Place Vendôme
in Paris close to the Cartier boutique). This became one of the leading leather goods
brands in Asia with boutiques in major duty-free shops across Asia. I remember that
later, when I worked at Cartier, I always sent him their latest leatherwood designs
from which he skilfully made (and even improved) copies. Once, I received a fax from
Alain Perrin, CEO of Cartier, asking me to investigate and possibly sue the Louis
Quatorze brand which I obediently did, though I could not find any incriminating
details despite my exhaustive efforts…
George’s creative and imaginative mind always thought of new schemes to make
money. After the ESL fiasco he came up with the following brilliant idea: he invented
an automatic condom in cooperation with a German condom factory.
The thing was supposed to work as follows: the condom in rolled-up form had a tiny
string attached which, once pulled, would roll it out like a roller curtain, thereby
avoiding messing about with the thing when in a hurry and amorous mood. It was
even more sexy if you invited the lady in question to initiate action by pulling the
cord herself.
We tried out a (German) concept model on beer bottles in various bars, of course to
the great hilarity of surrounding customers, who saw how well it functioned and we
actually sold a number of them while at those locations. Encouraged by the success, we
placed an order with the factory, but they had a minimum run of 10,000 pieces which,
in our optimistic mood of a huge success, we bought and had them shipped to Japan.
We found Mitsubishi Pharmaceuticals very interested as we demonstrated the products
in the boardroom on an Asahi beer bottle, and we signed a contract to distribute the
first 10,000 pieces through their chain of pharmacies. Of course, we were delighted
with this order as we sold them at 300% profit margin but, alas... In our enthusiasm
we forgot that a western male member is approximately the size of a beer bottle neck,
but the Japanese counterpart is rather like a Tabasco bottle neck and Mitsubishi soon
returned everything they bought because they did not fit the local customer.
It is rumoured the Japan started the Second World War because they were jealous of
the gweilo’s equipment. This envy can be proved by their behaviour when you enter
a Japanese hot bath: immediately, the local customers who each have a little towel
on their head remove it to cover the private parts. An unnecessary move in my mind
because without reading glasses they can hardly be seen anyway!
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We also received a number of bills for reimbursement which were incurred because
our product was lost during use and had to be retrieved by a gynaecologist. We lost
more than $50,000 US on this venture – a lot of money in those days. Lesson learnt:
Never undertake a new project without full research. Enthusiasm is often caused by
wishful thinking without getting the full facts.
There’s another equally amazing story about Robert White. I benefitted handsomely
from my participation in his company called Live Dynamics. He developed human
relation courses similar to Anthony Robbins’s and became hugely successful in Japan
with tens of thousands of graduates who paid up to $2,000 US for a three-day course.
Sometimes, when he lacked course trainers, I stepped in to impersonate one. This
was a huge learning curve for me. At one time he even had his own aeroplane with
RW White emblazoned on it, which was a source of dispute between shareholders.
Eventually, when it was time to move on with Shell, I sold my shares in this company,
but this time for a very handsome reward – thanks, Robert. He later expanded into
China where he again became highly successful and is now wealthy and retired,
living in Aspen, USA, with his fourth or fifth wife.
Me as a trainer at a Robert White training course – Tokyo, Japan
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Robert White – training course in Hangzhou (very recent photograph)
Robert White – training course in Hangzhou (very recent photograph)
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The course he ran obviously did not promote marital bliss but instead provided
ample opportunities for consoling some of his emotionally disturbed female students,
who adored him. He was, as you may gather, a very clever psychological speaker
(manipulator?) and we are still in regular contact.
Anthony Willoughby was another extraordinary entrepreneur who at one point (as
an old Harrovian!) toured the Far East as a ‘world champion’ in rope jumping. He
attracted not only crowds and money, but also many attractive blondes who were
mesmerised by his amazing muscle mass. He became quickly known (or so he was
fond of saying) as having the largest ‘tool’ in Asia (which explains his dislike for small
Asian ladies – a real misfit?).
Anthony Willoughby in the beginning
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Anthony Willoughby now. Anthony takes and still leads “I Will Not Complain” leadership
expeditions to Papua New Guinea and Mongolia
After he retired from rope jumping at the age of around 35 (maybe he became too
old?), he started a company called I Will Not Complain. I had a 40% share of this
company which performed executive training all over Japan, based on the principle:
‘Whatever the pain, don’t complain!’ He took groups of leading executives on truly
physically demanding hiking trips, like climbing Mount Fuji or trekking through an
African desert. Anthony had an amazing influence on the people he trained. He
once made the front-page of the Wall Street Journal. He became very well known in
Japan and China as he was an extraordinarily gifted speaker. When I sold my shares
in his company, I made multiples of my original investment. I am still in occasional
contact with him, and he still continues his training expeditions, probably with the
help of a walking stick or even wheelchair now.
Due to my full-time job at Shell, taking care of my kids in Yokohama, and being alone
(except when practising my hobby with local damsels – mainly on the weekends),
I was fully occupied and I loved the excitement.
After a few years in Japan, Shell sent me a notice to tell me I would be leaving Japan
to take over as temporary finance manager for Shell Ethiopia (the actual finance
manager was on leave). I was happy with this new adventure though I missed Japan,
and I knew very little about finance, so I was very much thrown in at the deep end.
This was a temporary role to cover the finance manager’s leave, so I was only there
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for two months. My children stayed with their mother in Holland while I stayed in
Addis Ababa in a suite at the Hotel Ethiopia. This was the best local hotel. However,
every night around 10pm there would be a knock on my door followed by a low
husky voice whispering, “C’est l’amour qui passe.” (“Love is passing by.”) Naturally,
I never opened my door.
Work in Ethiopia was very stressful as I tried to figure out complicated financial
matters, but the weekends were wonderful. I would go on safari with an Israeli army
group who I befriended (they were there to train the Ethiopian army). I particularly
remember an attractive female captain, Sarah (the wife of an Israeli commando
general), who could shoot a wild pig from 200 metres, which we would then eat for
dinner around the campfire.
I was asked to work out the budget for Shell for the next year and at first it
seemed impossible for Shell Ethiopia to turn a profit, but I finally figured out
that if I could bring the cost price down for crude oil, the company would quickly
become profitable. However, this was an unauthorised change to the worldwide
Shell accounting standards where everybody used the same parameters to make all
budgets comparable, i.e. the same price for crude oil, $2.95 per barrel, was used
worldwide. I ‘forgot’ to mention this in the budget proposal hoping nobody would
find out. The next week, I received a fax from the overall manager for Africa to
congratulate me on my work; I was very pleased. However, when the regional office
in London checked the details and found out what I had done I received a message
from London to report to head office. I was fired on the spot. This was the fourth
time in my short working life I’d been fired, in this case for transgressing Shell’s
code of ethics, or something like that.
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CHAPTER FIVE
Siber Hegner 1972–1979
Having lost my job at Shell (with only three months’ severance pay) I approached
several head-hunters specialising in expat jobs. As I was fluent in reading and
writing Japanese (very sought-after skills for international companies working in
Japan at that time), it was just a few weeks until I received an offer to join the biggest
Swiss trading company in Japan (after the usual interviews in Zurich, of course). The
company, Siber Hegner (SH), with 2,000 plus employees, was not only the leader
in the silk market – especially kimonos – but represented many of the foremost
reputable Swiss companies in Japan: watches (Vacheron Constantin, Omega and
Tissot); high-end jewellery; Dunhill lighters; and Parker pens – all market-leading
brands. Other agencies were high-end textile machinery and arms manufacturers (eg.
Oerlikon-Bührle, Switzerland).
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Vacheron Constantin original headquarters, Geneva
My initial job was GM of the consumer goods section, which sold Omega watches
(200,000 plus per year), Vacheron Constantin and Tissot. Vacheron Constantin were,
and still are, the world’s most expensive watches. I was also responsible for jewellery
and diamonds and grew to know and love these products, which would later become
useful in my time at Cartier. I travelled to Switzerland two to three times per year to
buy the collection for our future sales.
During one of my visits, I was invited by one of the board members of the Swiss
Watch Association for dinner in Geneva’s Ritz Carlton Hotel. At the dinner he told
me the following extraordinary story: “You know, Eric, one of my best friends is a
director of this hotel. Two months ago I was called up in the middle of the night
and was told that on the third floor a Middle Eastern servant was found without
his head.
At that time half of the hotel was occupied by some VIPs from the Middle East;
they made reservations for some months to escape the heat in their own country.
They usually occupied three to six floors of the hotel. The group included at least 30
eunuchs and a large number of women. What was I supposed to do in this situation?
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After some reflection I called a friend at the Department of Foreign Affairs at 3am
(nearly all influential Swiss businessmen are buddies) and asked him what to do. He
then contacted some top people in the government – they needed to avoid a scandal
as the financial relationship between the Middle East and the Swiss banking system
are significant. So, the following was decided as the most pragmatic solution: the
floor in question was declared diplomatic territory, and the following morning a
large crate of undeclared contents (this was now under diplomatic protection) was
shipped from the hotel to the airport and whisked away on a private plane. The
rumour was that a staff member had been more than appropriate when approaching
one of the consorts.” A great story, although it can never be verified.
Around 1971, Japan came into the watches market with the quartz (digital) movement,
which outdated the Swiss mechanical watch industry almost straight away. The Swiss
watch industry was old-fashioned and had never had any serious competition, with
delivery times of around three years for new orders. As a result, when I took over
the division, I was shouldered with a huge backlog of orders of automatic watches to
be delivered in the next three years (some 600,000 pieces!) as committed to by my
predecessor (who had been fired). There was a great deal of panic in Switzerland about
this, and the company feared for their future as the market was rapidly changing to
quartz technology. The chairman of the group sent me an urgent fax to come to
Zurich, and in the presence of their house bank chairman (of a large private bank),
I was requested to solve the situation by whatever means I could. I still remember that
it took me a few seconds to realise that this was the opportunity of a lifetime to make
a request for a super compensation package. They really had no other way out other
than appointing me: I spoke Japanese and knew the Japanese watch market with all
its distributors, dealers and complications from my job as GM of the Siber Hegner
consumer goods section which included their watch agencies and their jewellery.
I asked the chairman to pay me two million Swiss francs if I solved the problem
in two years (a request like this, made by an employee, was absolutely not Swiss
protocol). I then asked that if the company became profitable in those two years,
he would pay me a further two million Swiss francs and pay for sponsorship to the
Harvard Advanced Management Program. He did not like that at all, neither did
the bank chairman, but they had little choice, so they agreed in writing. I went
back to Japan, worked like a madman, fired half of the staff of the company (some
400 people) and, through all kinds of actions and dealer manipulations, succeeded
in solving the problem. After the second year, we had cleared the backlog of orders
and become profitable again. I also made contact with the Dumas family, owners
of the Hermès brand and they agreed to open a boutique with S as their agents
in Hong Kong (SH was very happy with this) but not in Japan where they opened
their own boutiques.
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Programme of my participation in a Japanese Speech Contest 1971 – second place
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During one of my home leaves (with Mrs June, Alex and Patrick in tow) I had asked
my brother Robert (my former ‘boss’ in Gusto) to line up a number of eligible highclass
ladies for dating and maybe further action. My first date was uneventful, a
daughter of a Dutch banker. The second date was more successful. She was called
Lizzie (RIP) and was one of Holland’s top golf players (handicap six) who was also
the daughter of a private banker. Lizzie was previously my brother Francis’s girlfriend,
for two months. At the time (seven years earlier) he was the rector of the illustrious
Amsterdam Student Corporation.
My brother Francis, rector of the illustrious Amsterdam Student Corporation 1953–1954
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Lizzie was a much taller than me and when I danced with her it was more cheek-tonavel
then cheek-to-cheek, which was not good for my ego, but she was very keen to
take things further. I invited her to Japan to get to know each other better but after
a three-week stay in Japan, I regretfully ended our relationship (in a very cowardly
fashion: by registered letter shortly after she returned to Holland). I am happy to
add that she did not need to wait long (had I been a good learning experience?)
before she met one of Holland’s most eligible bachelors, RvH textile magnate, and
an old Corps friend of mine. From what I heard she later became the trainer of the
Dutch national golf team and got married to my old buddy – both, unfortunately,
recently passed away.
My third date: bingo! I met Anne Marie, the eldest daughter of the foremost real
estate developer and press star, Reinder Zwolsman, who was at this time at the top
of his career. He not only possessed vast real estate properties (Hotel Paris on the
Place Vendôme, Paris; the Grand Hotel Amrath Kurhaus in The Hague; Amstel
Hotels in Holland; and the Euromast in Rotterdam – then the highest revolving
restaurant and nightclub in Europe) but was also an accomplished singer and one of
the Holland’s greatest war heroes during the German occupation. He played a vital
role as a double agent, on the surface cooperating with the Germans but secretly
reporting directly to our Dutch Queen Wilhelmina’s own team in London. For his
work he was later awarded the highest Dutch decoration for bravery: the Bronzen
Leeuw (Bronze Lion), which was awarded to him after the war in 1951, personally, by
Her Majesty Queen Juliana, who referenced an official quote from the government
while decorating him: “for brave and discreet acts in the fight against the enemy”.
It was agreed by the Monarchy and by the Dutch government in exile in London
during the war that: “Zwolsman repeatedly put his life at risk during the occupation
years”.
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Anne Marie on our wedding day
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Reinder Zwolsman (RIP) – Anne Marie’s father
Mrs Zwolsman (RIP), mother of Anna Marie and grandmother of Pier
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Anna Marie’s family home, the Zwolsman residence, Wassenaar, Park Rust en Vreugd
Mr Zwolsman’s summer house, Loosdrecht, Hollandsnook
Anne Marie was a very attractive Dutch lady with a social standing that enticed me,
being as insecure as I was then. Within a few weeks we were engaged and a few months
later married at the Hague Cathedral. The marriage was a huge affair. My father-inlaw
sang Ave Maria in his magnificent baritone voice, accompanied by Holland’s most
famous violinist, Theo Oloff (Dutch Symphony Orchestra). After the ceremony we
went to their family estate in Loosdrecht, one of Holland’s most beautiful lake estates
where the party continued deep into the night with hundreds of guests. I will never
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forget that Mr Z started playing the organ in his house (he had a huge church organ
installed) at around 2am to the tune of Zijt gij welgekomen Jezus (Eric) lieve Heer (a Dutch
religious song which translates to: “Did you come well, Jesus (Eric) my Lord?”). Within
nine months, on 15th July 1973, Anne Marie delivered my third son, Eric Pier, in
Bluff Hospital in Yokohama. He was named after the Scheveningse Pier also built by
his grandfather; the name Pier was also influenced by the fact that that Mr Zwolsman
always maintained that he was a direct descendant of the De Grote Pier, a well-known
warrior and Frisian rebel leader (c.1480–28 October 1520).
Mr Zwolsman’s wife, Mrs Zwolsman (RIP), the mother of Anne Marie and grandmother
of Alex, Patrick and Pier (and still technically my mother-in-law), was a very special
lady, who not only took care of her quite extraordinary, extroverted, larger-than-life
husband and her five children (she had two daughters and three sons herself) but
also us when we needed a place to stay when I was between jobs after Shell but before
Siber Hegner (I met Anne Marie shortly before being fired from Shell). She received
us in her palatial estate in Wassenaar with open arms and was like a grandmother
for Alex and Patrick who called her Oma, and we all became very close to her. She
would even host some big dinner parties on my behalf while Alex, Patrick and Pier
attended the local international school for one year. I am especially grateful for her
hospitality and care and giving us the love we needed when we needed it the most.
Scheveningse Pier, Den Haag
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The Grand Hotel, Amrath Kurhaus in The Hague
De Grote Pier painting
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Mr Zwolsman with his (De Grote Pier’s) legendary 7ft sword
My life in Yokohama now continued with Anne Marie and our three children where
we spent many years enjoying the benefits of this wonderful country and the many
friends we made in Yokohama. We had now moved to a new house, very modern,
with a large garden right opposite the renowned international Yokohama Country
& Athletic Club (YC&AC). Anne Marie adjusted very quickly and very well to
Japan and enjoyed our stay out there, although I was often absent on business travel
around the country. On weekends we often frequented the many, sake-filled, quaint
and wonderful little restaurants surrounding the house. The whole family were very
active in sports and at one time I was the squash champion of the YC&AC. Also,
we had a jogging club on Sunday mornings with three other friends (Frits van Riet
(RIP), Mannas Boele and Hans Pauli) which always ended up in a copiously alcoholinfused
brunch organised by one of the wives (this totally nullified any of the jogging
benefits and usually ended in early evening).
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Anne Marie with Alex, Pier and Patrick
Anne Marie
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Anne Marie with Alexander
In July 1979, I went to Zurich to collect my financial settlement. I was met at the
airport by one of the board members of SH and we drove along the Bahnhofstrasse to
the head office of one of their main bankers. He told me, “You see all those beautiful
buildings here, most of them are private banks and to ensure discretion, a number of
them have big parking places behind their offices, hidden from view from the main
street. Once you park your car there you talk into the microphone which is installed
on every parking place. After the verbal code has been approved, you are directed to
a numbered garage which opens when your car approaches. You drive into the garage,
the door closes, and you are in an elevator which transports you to the designated
floor. The door opens and you are in an official meeting to do whatever business
you need to do. This is the way Switzerland works. Whatever you bring in your car
is then offloaded, counted and so on.” In our case we had nothing to hide, and we
went through the main entrance of an impressive old building. In the boardroom
I was given the promised cheque of two million Swiss francs.
In the presence of some directors of the bank, my chairman who also attended,
addressed me as follows, “Eric you have done a great job for our company and you
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have solved our precarious financial situation, but you have broken all the rules of
a Swiss employee. Switzerland works differently from any other country and the
elevator system in many of these buildings shows you how we can deal with any
situation around the world. Recently some large gold shipments from somewhere
around the world were delivered here in the Bahnhofstrasse in a similar way, out of
the prying eyes of passers-by. We work on the basis of ultimate loyalty and secrecy,
and this is something you do not know about.”
I sat there rather flustered, with the cheque in my hand and I left through the
normal exit of the bank – and now found myself fired for the fifth time. Switzerland
is a very paternalistic country, where ruling families own everything and everyone
else are underlings. I am Dutch, and I believe I have to stick to my own rules, which
means I grab an opportunity when it comes along. Throughout my life, I have
had this opportunistic attitude, which was at odds, of course, with the Swiss way
of thinking. I have always remembered my father saying to me on my graduation
dinner from university, “Eric, you just finished the easiest university with the easiest
courses that allow top grades in the shortest time. I am proud of you, but you are
not an intellectual; you are an opportunist. And in your future life, you should
remember that 1 + 1 = 3 for you and 2 for somebody else. Also remember: onkruid
vergaat niet (bad grass never dies).”
I did not feel too bad about what had happened, because I remembered my father’s
life lessons and was delighted with the substantial bank account I suddenly had
(in Switzerland). The company back in Japan had perhaps taken a knock to their
reputation having fired so many staff, as Japan is known as the country of lifelong
employment. However, if I had not made this move, the company, and SH, the parent
company, could have gone bankrupt. I also had the entrance document for the sixmonth
Harvard AMP course in my pocket. This was a very prestigious course, taken
by experienced and ambitious young managers and sponsored by companies from all
over the world. It was expensive, too, because the company paid a $65,000 tuition fee
for me, a substantial sum in those days.
The Harvard management programme was interesting, with some 60 other
participants from all over the world, many ambitious young leaders in their own
companies. We were inundated by head-hunters who were looking at us as very
saleable products for their own businesses, so they approached us with many
proposals for employment. During my third month of the course, I was approached
to become managing director of Cartier Far East in Hong Kong. I accepted this
offer with both hands, as I was delighted to go back to the Far East (to which I had
really, already dedicated my life, as it is the best place in the world to live), and the
prestige and immensely creative jewellery designs, including watches, fascinated
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me. I also spoke fluent French as my mother was a French-speaking Belgian. I still
remember my first French study book (issued by the French government) which, on
the opening page, had a picture of a lady in the kitchen and a man smoking a pipe
while waiting for the food being prepared for him. The first line read as follows:
Papa fume une pipe avec Maman dans la cuisine. It took only one day for a boy to write
a note on the blackboard when the French teacher was not yet there: et Maman
fume la pipe de Papa, of course, to great hilarity of the entire class.
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CHAPTER SIX
Cartier 1979–1983
After I had finished the management programme, I was sent to Paris for a training
course. Being the only non-Jew, non-circumcised, non-French board member it
was quite an experience. But I was a bit like a chameleon, and I adjusted quickly to
this new world of glamour, movie stars and jewellery. In the meantime, Anne Marie
had replaced Mrs June and she, together with my now three children, were back
in the Netherlands staying with her parents, whilst I was awaiting confirmation of
my next career move after Harvard. After a few months in Paris and working with
some glamorous Cartier female staff (female beauty was an essential requirement for
working with Cartier), I moved to Hong Kong. My family joined me later in the year
after the children finished their school year.
Upon arrival in January 1980, I was met at the airport by the then managing director
of Cartier, a famous man in the luxury industry, Philippe Charriol, in a Rolls-Royce.
He turned out to be one of the biggest social players in Hong Kong and the Cartier
brand image was one of exclusivity and success, which reflected upon any wearer of
their products. (Philippe (RIP) tragically died in February 2019 in a car crash whilst
racing his Porsche on the Circuit Paul Ricard, home of the 2018 Formula 1 French
Grand Prix.)
In this atmosphere, I blossomed, surrounded by starlets, photo models and more
people of that nature, and I threw huge parties in Hong Kong. One time, we organised
a cocktail party in the vaults of the Hong Kong Shanghai Bank, and a five-carat
diamond ring was given as a prize for the person wearing the heaviest pearls.
The Chinese love jewellery, for its prestige and for its value (important if they have
to flee somewhere) so were, of course, loaded with this kind of stuff. The winner was
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a retired model from Kowloon, in Hong Kong, who weighed in at 98kg, including
48kg of pearls. This event, like all Cartier activities, was widely reported in the local
press (Tatler magazine gave us their front page) and organising them was part of my
job description.
Another remarkable occasion was the launching of Cartier in Australia and the
opening of the first Cartier boutique in Sydney. A local PR company organised a
black-tie VIP event inviting the usual pack of local movie stars and models who were
very happy to give acte de presence for a substantial attendance fee. In the end, some
600 people attended with a helicopter spraying Cartier perfume (thinned down with
water) over the ecstatic crowd. Press coverage was wonderful, and the new boutique
had record sales growth during the first quarter.
Every month, we had a meeting in Paris in the Cartier office on the Place Vendôme,
where we were required to personally report progress and accountability for the huge
entertainment expenses, along with all the other regional directors, to the managing
director of the group, a man called Alain Perrin. Perrin was the icon of the French
luxury industry, who created the company himself by buying the last surviving two,
or three, Cartier jewellery boutiques and transforming the name into a worldwide
brand.
Cartier, Place Vendôme, Paris, (original store which was reopened on 15th March 2020)
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Cartier would throw huge black-tie parties on the Place Vendôme throughout
the years (source: Les Temps du Cartier)
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The name Cartier, although renowned worldwide, had become somewhat faded after
the war. You can now treat a lady to a 50/50 McDonald’s hamburger in exchange
for an amorous session (a horizontal language lesson) whilst in the old days only a
Cartier ring or similar would suffice to achieve the same purpose. So, as the Cartier
boutique business shrank dramatically over the years, it was ripe for a takeover. The
new Cartier threw huge black-tie parties on the Place Vendôme attended by whoever
was important at that time, again including models and movie stars. I once attended
a champagne dinner and sat opposite Anita Ekberg (RIP). I most vividly remember
her rather amazing bosom…
Anita Ekberg (promotional photo distributed and copy given to me at a Cartier party)
In 1983, I attended what turned out to be my last monthly meeting. Perrin had a
habit of picking one of his eight regional directors during such a meeting and – in
often vile language – shouted and cursed at him, picking out all he had done wrong
to set an example for all those present. His diatribe would be littered with expletives,
such was his management style. We would all really fear these meetings and no one
wanted to be the one on the receiving end. He always used French slang (argot),
which I often did not understand, so, to prepare myself for this particular meeting,
I bought the Larousse French dictionary of dirty words (two tomes of more than 500
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pages each). Sure enough, my time came up and he started addressing me as the Le
Con Hollandais who “thought he could spend as much as he wanted”. These meetings
were always high pressure, as Cartier was a high-pressure group that expected figures
of 48–50% growth per year. As a student, I learnt that when someone hits you in the
face or assaults you verbally, you react by doing the same in return in order to deter
them. I looked up ‘con’ in the dictionary.
“What are you doing?” shouted Alain.
“I am looking up the word ‘con’ (dickhead) in the dictionary,” I replied calmly.
Alain was a very ambitious character whose drive and ambition had got him to the
top of the jewellery world at the time. Everybody laughed, but I had made him so
angry that he picked up an ashtray and threw it at me at the other end of the table,
where some 20 people were seated. Drawing on my lesson from my student days
(when someone hits you, you always hit back, no matter their size or the consequence),
I threw the ashtray back which unfortunately hit his head, 12 metres away from me.
There was pandemonium, of course, but the result was that I was sent out of the
boardroom with Perrin shouting at me, “Viré! Viré!” (“Fired! Fired!”)
Needless to say, this was the end of my career in the jewellery business and made
this the sixth time I was fired. What Perrin did not realise at the time was that he
had signed an English Hong Kong-based employment contract that was extremely
advantageous to me should my job be terminated. One clause in the contract gave me
a 10% bonus on the net profits of Cartier Far East. However, during my stay in Hong
Kong, I had convinced top management (Moshe Levine was the chairman of the
Swiss holding company in Geneva) that it would be fiscally extremely advantageous
for the company to re-invoice all duty-free sales in the world through Hong Kong. So
suddenly the turnover had shot up in Hong Kong to around 135 million US dollars
from a previous modest 12 million, especially because the Bahamas and Far East
duty-free invoicing business was very successful. (This was very soon after the Paribas
Geneva Branch separated from its mother bank in Paris due to tax investigations
into (possibly) illegal French-owned bank accounts held at their Swiss subsidiary, and
which became a huge scandal in France!) To cut a long story short, I went back to the
super Cartier penthouse where we lived with magnificent views over Hong Kong on
the Peak, and told Anne Marie that I was out of a job again.
The next day, jobless, I went to a prestigious legal firm called Johnson, Stokes and
Masters with my contract. The solicitors I met there proposed to me a no win, no
fee deal (‘no cure, no pay’). In other words, they asked for 20% of the payout that
they could wring out of Cartier. I refused, because, with the little knowledge of law
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I had acquired, I knew I had a watertight case. Cartier would never countersue me,
because their practice of avoiding French taxes by ring-fencing through Hong Kong
and Switzerland would have driven the French press wild with bad publicity, and
could possibly have raised some unwelcome fiscal questions in France about this
practice as well. After some rather heated correspondence back and forth between
Paris and myself, the contract was settled for a rather modest payout for me, as they
were extremely tough negotiators (compared to my yearly profit share contractual
rights of 10%), of 1.5 million US dollars (as the yearly profits including duty-free sales
ran at about 12–15 million US dollars). Needless to say, from that moment on, I was
ostracised by the Cartier organisation.
So, now I had been fired for the sixth time, it made me realise that under the proper
conditions, being fired can be very profitable! The contract also stipulated that
I could stay for 18 months in company housing (a huge penthouse on the Peak with
monthly rent of Hk$180,000 or US$22,500) in the case of a one-sided termination
of contract, including my full Far East salary. So, this time there was little stress, if at
all, and I took my family for a one-month trip to Sri Lanka and we had a great time.
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CHAPTER SEVEN
Friesland Foods 1983–2005, Sailing
Escapades and My Real Estate Investments
I
returned from the holiday in Sri Lanka with no job but no stress, as I had more
than sufficient money to be able to take my time finding new employment.
However, I soon became restless and began to look for investment possibilities for
all of my cash. The timing was right, because, around that time, there was a housing
market crisis in Europe, especially in Holland, where banks had to confiscate
hundreds of thousands of properties whose owners were bankrupt with interest
rates at 16% and up. One bank, Rabobank, offered me a portfolio of approximately
120 apartments, 40 shops and two small offices in The Hague for 105% mortgage,
but with prepayment of the expected negative cash flow for the coming three years,
for which I had the (Swiss) cash. I immediately accepted the deal as I knew as an
elemental economist that 16% interest rates were unsustainable and would soon
crash down, as they did! So, suddenly, I became a large property owner in The Hague
which required numerous trips to Holland.
During this time my youngest brother, Seven, who is currently the Honorary Consul
of the Kingdom of The Netherlands for the provinces of Phuket, Krabi, Phang Nga
and Suratthani, as well as Dean of the Consular Corps in Phuket, introduced me
to Robert Schipper, the managing director of the largest Dutch dairy group (later
called Friesland Campina which is now the second largest dairy company in Europe,
after Nestlé), who was looking for a general manager for their Hong Kong and China
operations. I accepted the job immediately as I was bored with doing nothing but
golfing, sailing and partying in Hong Kong. Thank you, Seven.
There were only six people working for the company in Hong Kong (called Friesland
Foods) in a grubby district called Wan Chai. At the time we were the market leaders
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in Hong Kong and south China for sweetened condensed milk and evaporated milk,
and were highly profitable. The daily consumption of sweetened condensed milk
surely is the reason that the Chinese have some of the worst teeth in the world.
As there were not many refrigerators at that time, households needed long life
(canned) milk products and we provided those. The volumes were huge (200 plus
50ft containers per month) and I accepted their offer, because I needed to be busy
again, but I found myself with very deep contrary feelings about the prestige of selling
jewellery and the prestige of selling milk products.
This was a totally different and unknown world to me. The company was the largest
dairy company in Holland, but it was a cooperative based on farmers. The whole board
of the company were active farmers in the north of Holland. These were quite different
social circles to those in which I had been mixing. However, having adjusted to my
new circumstances with a company that was very generous with their employment
package (housing, schooling costs, car, etc., but no profit sharing), I overcame my
inferiority feelings after a few months. I started thriving in the job, which also involved
representing the World Food Bank, helping to distribute essential food to countries
such as Bangladesh, Pakistan and India. This job had meaning and value compared
to my previous superficial activities with spoiled rich clients.
Seven at an audience with His Majesty King Willem-Alexander, Her Majesty Queen
Máxima and Her Royal Highness Princess Beatrix on the occasion of the HC Conference in
The Hague, April 2018. When the King was introduced to Seven during the conference he
remarked, “Are you the Smulders in whose penthouse I stayed many years ago to watch the
Monaco Grand Prix?” “No, Your Majesty,” he replied, “that was my older brother, Robert.”
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Within a few months I had appointed three product managers whose duties were
to scout the supermarket shelves for saleable brands and then prepare professional
marketing proposals to be sent to the brand owners. Most of the agencies for these
brands were in the hands of two old colonial trading companies (Jardines and
Swire) who did little to promote these products in the market as they kind of sold
by themselves because of their brand name. So, when our professional marketing
reports were received by the brand owners, they were so impressed that some of the
major consumer brands on the market changed their agencies over to us. In this way
we acquired brands like Heinz, Tabasco, Campbell’s soup, McDonald’s milkshake
powders and many others. When we became agents for McDonald’s milkshake
powders in China, I was sent to the McDonald University in the US, all-expensespaid
for a one-week instruction course on food hygiene, corporate philosophy, etc.
I learned how to make the perfect hamburger and how to put enough ice cubes
in a milkshake to maximise profits. During the food hygiene course and to my
considerable disgust they showed me a movie detailing the amount of sputum coming
out of peoples’ mouths when talking. This was represented in colour sprayed over an
open buffet with some yellow, red and blue dots presumably caused by people who
are coughing. I have never touched a buffet since or at least I try to be the first person
to serve myself.
We became very creative in finding other food products, such as the selling of chicken
feet to China. Chinese love to eat chicken feet but they are considered as garbage
by European chicken farms and sold for next to nothing. Within a few months we
had an extremely profitable business going, shipping a few chicken feet containers
per month, initially with huge profits, though very quickly the Chinese competition
took over this business and prices were destroyed, so, that was the end of this trade.
Similarly, pigs’ ovaries were a Chinese delicacy and aphrodisiac but after we got going
with a few shipments and a few containers of these, business was destroyed in a
similar way.
I came up with a much more creative idea and that was the export of chocolate
milk powder to Japan. In those days both chocolate and milk powder were highly
taxed by the Japanese to protect the local producers, but chocolate powder, for
some reason, could be exported at a very low tax rate. So, we shipped tens of
containers of Friesland chocolate milk powder to Japan where a local distributor
somehow centrifuged this product, transforming it into milk powder and chocolate
powder and these products could be sold separately at huge profit margins. Of
course, after some time, the Japanese authorities woke up to this little trick after
receiving complaints from the leading chocolate maker, Morinaga. So, this highly
rewarding business was stopped abruptly, but we had still enjoyed remarkable
trading figures.
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Within two years we had tripled the turnover and profits soared to the delight of our
Dutch (farmer) shareholders. The Tabasco brand was my champion brand as within
two years we became the biggest Tabasco distributor in the world, with huge demand
from China (from an initial 12,000 bottles per month to 300,000 per month; the
Chinese loved this stuff). Profit margins were magnificent at approximately 30 cents
per bottle and we had no competition. It is no wonder my employers were more
than delighted with the profit explosion and never put any restraint on my rather
excessive corporate spending (which I had grown used to from my time at Cartier).
For example, I bought a Daimler for my partner, Elisabeth – more on Elisabeth later
– and a Jaguar for my friend and employee, Bernard. To avoid undue attention in
Leeuwarden these cars were included under unspecified ‘corporate vehicles’ (we had
a fleet of delivery trucks) in the balance sheet.
The Tabasco story is so extraordinary, and the product became so important in my
life that I cannot leave out a short description:
The McIlhenny family (owners of Tabasco, located on Avery Island outside New
Orleans) were so happy with our performance in two years, as we became their
biggest distributor, that they invited the manager who I had appointed, Bernard
Yiu, and me for a five-day visit to their factory, which included three days, all costs
provided, partying around Bourbon Street in New Orleans. During our visit I was
told by one of the family members the extraordinary story of Tabasco which had
been in the family for nearly 200 years. It was after the American Civil War that a
certain Colonel McIlhenny from the Confederate Army ended up on Avery Island
and married one of the daughters of the slave-owning family of the island, which
was one of the largest slaving estates in the southern US. Suddenly they were faced
with a crisis as, at the end of the American Civil War, they had to pay a ‘salary’ to
their now free ex-slaves. The Colonel was an amateur botanist and started a farm
on the island where he initially grew, amongst others, orchids and exotic plants like
Tabasco peppers imported from Mexico. Somehow, he invented a process to extract
the juice from the peppers, mix it with vinegar and some other stuff which became
Tabasco sauce that he marketed around New Orleans. The iconic Tabasco bottle was
originally an eau de cologne bottle and when the factory manufacturing this cologne
went bankrupt, he bought a large stock of remaining empty bottles which he then
used for his Tabasco sauce.
In the 1930s he imported a strain of magnificent Malaysian orchids which needed
deep roots of two to three metres to flourish. Whatever he tried they wouldn’t grow,
but after performing soil tests salt was discovered, which became the largest salt mine
in the US some decennia later. Around 1960 somebody from Esso called asking for
permission to do some wild catting (drilling) on the island. Sure enough, they found
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oil under the salt layers and Avery Island is now home to one of the biggest private
oilfields in the US. No wonder that they never accepted any of the many takeover
bids they received for this worldwide unique brand. As the saying goes, the Gods
really pissed on the McIlhenney’s shoulders. The orchid farm is now one of the
biggest in the world and the money received from the millions of yearly visitors alone
pays for the whole production process of Tabasco. “Hallelujah, Praise the Lord” sing
the local employees (still 98% black workers) in their gospels in church on Sundays.
And that’s the Tabasco story.
One day I was walking through a supermarket and I noticed a shopper loading three
carts with food items. Curious as I am, I asked him, “What are you doing with all that
food, do you have a number of wives and kids to look after?” He smiled and replied,
“No, but I am the food and beverage manager of the Holiday Inn hotel in Beijing
and every two weeks I come to Hong Kong to buy supplies for our restaurants.” That
night the idea came to me that at Friesland Foods we could fulfil that role much
better by bringing the needed food directly to the hotels in China, a rapidly growing
market. So, the next six months were spent appointing wholesalers in the major
cities in China who would stock our brands and distribute them to the local hotels
and supermarkets. At first of course, this was met with considerable resistance from
the food and beverage managers who saw their pleasant and regular trips to Hong
Kong disappear. However, we continued our efforts and in a short time a whole new
business grew out of nothing, not only for the food products but also for the dairy
products, much to the delight of our cooperative farm owners.
After two years on the job the company had so much money that Friesland bought
a new 12,000ft office in the centre of Hong Kong far away from grubby Wan Chai.
This office was later sold for six times the purchase price after my retirement, another
pleasant surprise for the Friesland farmers (my employers). At that time, our staffing
had increased from less than 10 to 200 plus employees; we now had three offices in
China. I thrived, travelled a lot, and loved my work.
In the meantime, I had appointed an extraordinarily capable young Chinese manager
called Bernard Yiu (still one of my best friends) and he quickly took over my daily
work which left me with ample time to pursue further interests. In my second year
our Dutch parent company bought the Foremost Group, a company that existed
from selling ice cream to the US troops all over the Far East. Suddenly I was also
charged with the management of a large ice cream factory in South Korea, so I added
Korea to my field of work and learned basic Korean.
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Greenland Gardens brochure and financial statement of capital –
Rabobank investments, 1992
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Through the China business I met many people and one of them was Thomas
Yau. Thomas was a real estate developer in Beijing and was looking for a partner
to develop the first housing compound for expatriates as there was a huge lack of
suitable foreign housing. For example, some local expat houses had baths just one
metre in length, where no properly fed American wife could fit more than her two
legs in without spilling all the water. Having acquired a taste for real estate with my
booming Rabobank deal a few years earlier in The Hague, Thomas quickly raised
my interest and I jumped on the opportunity to take a 50% share. In exchange for
his expertise and full-time dedication to the development for which I had no time,
I provided Thomas with the start-up cash and explicitly asked him to provide extralarge
baths.
My old connections with Shell enabled me to sell the project to Shell China who
at that time employed a few hundred expats and their families for a massive oil
exploration exercise. They quickly agreed to sign a lease rental contract for the whole
project for five years, that was for some 50 houses and 200 apartments. Bingo! This
was a fantastic opportunity as Dutch and British banks were eager to provide finance
for a project that was basically guaranteed by Shell and located in booming China.
With a huge bank loan, we started building and despite the daily construction and
political headaches, Thomas managed to complete the project in three years and
the first major foreign development built in Beijing, called Greenland Gardens, was
ready for occupation. I was also in charge of Friesland Foods Singapore, so I was very
busy, but thoroughly enjoyed my various jobs.
One of my other good friends at the time was a wonderful fellow called Sjouke Postma,
who with great success had founded and expanded the Rabobank activities in Hong Kong
and China. With him I made my first real estate investments in Hong Kong and China
which turned out to be very profitable investments as well. After some attractive real
estate deals in Hong Kong our first investment in China were a few houses in Shanghai,
‘luckily’ financed by… would you guess who? Rabobank. Once, my son Alex, then living
in Beijing with his family, called me to say that he had met Sjouke at an embassy cocktail
party. There, Sjouke showed him a large paper bag full of local renminbi which were
the proceeds of the sale of our joint investment in Shanghai (where we doubled our
money in less than one year as this city was booming). He proudly told Alex, “I have
your inheritance here in this bag.” At the time there was no working banking system in
China and almost all transactions were done in cash. The problem was that Sjouke, who
loved a good whisky as much as everybody else, woke up the next morning and forgot
where he had put the bag with our joint money. It took many hours of retracing his steps
around the various Beijing nightlife spots he had visited until he finally found the bag
safely sealed and stored in the safe of his hotel (the famous Peace Hotel in Beijing) which
he had totally forgotten he had booked…early Alzheimer’s?
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Anne Marie had been very busy with Pier and her two ‘adopted’ children who quickly
had grown very close to her, as they still are today. After a few years, Alex left to study at
the Colorado School of Mines for an MBA in petroleum engineering and Patrick was
accepted to St. Paul’s boarding school near Boston and later Eton and Harvard. Pier
followed with boarding school at the Dragon near Oxford (at a very young age like me
at St. Jozef’s), and later went to Eton, Brown University in Rhode Island and Harvard.
Patrick becomes the UK National winner of the School Hurdles
Championships (under 18s) for Eton
At one time, probably after considerable amounts of my usual Ketel vodka, I posted
on the internet: Sperm for sale with two-times Harvard graduate DNA inside – impeccable
origin but personal delivery only after picture exchange. I got thousands of replies but,
honestly, never followed up. That being said, my children still believe they have some
half-brothers or half-sisters somewhere around the world.
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Super proud Opa: following in Patrick’s footsteps (see page opposite). Declan (Dutchy)
winning the gold medal for All England Prep School Judo Championships, 5th March 2022
Belmond Reid’s Palace Hotel, Funchal, Madeira, for my parent’s 80th birthdays
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Black’s Link 1, Hong Kong, Christmas 1998
I always had a dream to buy a boat and sail the oceans. From a very young age I have
been crazy about the sea, diving and fishing. My first boat in Hong Kong was a very fast
45ft catamaran called the Horny Cat, a name given by the previous owner. As it is very
bad luck to change a boat’s name once it has been baptised, I of course had to keep it
the same. Its curious name soon became well-known in Hong Kong racing circles and
always caused hilarity when the Horny Cat was mentioned in award-giving ceremonies
at the Hong Kong Yacht Club, as it was a fast ship and we won quite a few races. My
second boat was a trimaran called Try Again Three owned by a German called Hanz,
who had moved to Canada after the war. He, with some friends, built this ship and
sailed around the world only to find himself stranded in Hong Kong without money.
Somehow, I got to know about the boat, saw it and bought it on the spot. I was now the
proud owner of a trimaran and sold my catamaran the Horny Cat. In the boat he had
built a remarkable large wood carving with the self-explanatory inscription, “Ass or gas
but nobody rides for free” – I kept this sign on the boat for as long as I had it.
After a few more years I bought my third boat, a two-master of 60ft in length called
the Luo Shen. Every year we participated in the South China Sea races with an
eight-staff crew including my great buddies: Henk Stijweg, Mark van Ogtrop (also
nicknamed ‘van Achterop’), Eric Verkain, the navigator (nicknamed ‘The Vaginator’
(RIP)), Freek de Nes, Lucas Klarenbeek (nicknamed Klaarkoombeek or ‘Mr Orgasm’),
Jan van Loo (called ‘van de Water’ (RIP)) and Eduard van Voorst (called the ‘Baron’,
which he was), Edje Kooy and more. We would spend some six to eight days battling
heavy waves up to 10 metres high to Manila (500 miles) or Puerto Azul, competing
with 50 or 60 other yachts. Upon arrival there were huge parties and when the fleet
arrived in Puerto Azul or Manila, we were always greeted by busloads of local ladies
who wanted to meet their (so long deprived from female company) ‘sea heroes’.
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In my younger days and now (below). Did I mention I loved sailing and always wanted my
own boat? (Note: I am chained to the wheel on the racing yacht)
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During one particular race we ended up in a hurricane and because I had the
heaviest boat with the highest handicap, we won the race on handicap. However, my
vice-captain, Lucas Klarenbeek (Klaarkoombeek), and navigator, Eric Verkain (‘The
Vaginator’), were so drunk that they forgot to check us in with the arrival committee
in Puerto Azul. We were disqualified as a result, and at the prize-giving in the Hong
Kong Yacht Club later, we were awarded the silver toilet bucket instead of first prize:
a huge and prestigious silver trophy.
Part of my duties as captain during the races was to look after the health of the
crew. During the race to the Philippines, I had experienced sailors on board, but on
return we usually took some passengers; mainly wives or girlfriends. On one return
trip we hit stormy weather and the wife of my good friend, Genevieve van de Water
(van Loo), got so seasick that I had to give her the ultimate seaman’s medicine: a
rocket-like suppository made by a specialist French company. The kit, fortunately for
me, included a glove which I used. She did recover sufficiently enough to later hold
down some food. Apparently, if dehydration is too severe, it’s necessary to blow in
a large amount of water in ‘that way’ through a large diameter straw or tube, which,
fortunately, I never had to do myself.
On one of our return trips, we came too close to one of the South China Sea islands
called Spratly Islands and were shot at by Chinese gunners who had illegally occupied
the islands to build their military bases. Sure enough, one shot went through the
main sail and left a big hole which we triumphantly showed to the press in Hong
Kong upon return. The result was a headline in the South China Morning Post and
Chinese newspapers in Hong Kong (which were still British) with a picture of a ship
and a big hole in the sail reading, “Dutch sailors shot at by the Chinese illegally
occupying the Spratly islands!”
On another occasion I was asked by one of my best friends Michel X (RIP) to help
him sail his creaky sailing yacht, a 45-footer, from Hong Kong to Singapore with him,
a non-experienced sailor, as captain. Michel was a wonderful, colourful friend who
had a profitable shipping business in Hong Kong and wanted to move his business
to Singapore and to move his boat there as well. His business partner was a younger
Chinese lady with whom he was rumoured to have had a long term, intra-office,
romantic relationship with. One day he called me to intervene in a dispute about a
diamond ring he had given her. The diamond was so tiny that it was barely visible
under the naked eye and appeared to be very cheap quality (which was very difficult
to see because of its size). She said to me, “You know I have screwed this man for
many years and wasted my life for this tiny, shitty ring.” After assuring her that it was
a Cartier ring (of course it was not!) I had sold to Michel at an immensely expensive
price, she calmed down and I presume, continued her romantic activities with him.
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We left Hong Kong with a crew of six for an epic 14-day trip on the clear understanding
that there would be no alcohol onboard; Michel would become aggressive and
argumentative after a few tipples. A few days into the trip we noticed a change in his
normal behaviour and sure enough after the crew searched the boat, we found eight
bottles of brandy hidden under the floorboards. There was no satellite navigation
yet, so the course was adjusted hourly on large maps, under Michel’s supervision as
the captain, with a sextant and dead reckoning. At some time around 4am on the
third night, while resting, I noticed a change in the noise that the waves made against
the boat (you get very perceptive to the wave sounds against the hull). I immediately
jumped up to investigate and saw an island a few hundred metres ahead of us. Amidst
lots of shouting, the two crew on watch immediately ‘gybed’ the boat and sure enough
we narrowly escaped a seaman’s death, somewhere off the coast of Vietnam. Later,
checking out what had happened, we found that we were on the proper course,
but Michel had set the course line right across a tiny ‘x’ on the chart. This was the
tiny island we nearly hit (plus the watch was also sleepy?). So, all booze was tossed
overboard much to Michel’s displeasure as he was the captain and was supposed to
be the final decision maker – not in this instance.
Yacht racing in the South China Seas
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Yacht racing – me and the guys (and the “Horny Cat” cup!) From Left: Eric Verkain,
The Captain, Freek de Nes, Jan van Loo, Edje Kooy, Ed van Breen, Sjouke Postma
After more near-misses avoiding nasty collisions with a couple of oil tankers
(Singapore is the main oil refining centre in the Far East) we finally arrived in
Singapore after two weeks. One remark I will never forget was from one of my
crew members, Freek de Nes: he had caught and cleaned a fish, then smelled his
hands and said, “This reminds me of a night hobbying in Wan Chai!” Freek was
an ex-special forces officer and even in the worst weather he would go forward on
the deck and climb the mast to fit a stuck sailing rope. He did pay heed to my real
estate stories during our trips together and after he left from Hong Kong he built
an equally large real estate portfolio in Holland. Freek, I am still waiting for my
consultant fees! Not long after the trip, Michel settled in Singapore, where I visited
him regularly. We always had a lot of fun together (he could be very funny). He
then became ill and passed away a few years later. I was honoured to read his final
eulogy in his local church in Singapore.
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From left: Sjouke Postma, Jan van Loo, Dr. John, me and Michel X
Sailing a small boat through dark nights, huge waves and sometimes even with lives
at risk, will create an unbreakable bond. I will never forget the nights when we were
all forced to sit in the outside cockpit as 10-metre-plus waves crashed over the boat
because being inside the cabin was too dangerous if the boat turned over. For many
hours we would be clipped via our harnesses to a cable around the boat to prevent
us from being swept away and not be found again. In bad weather feeding the crew
was a hazardous event and most of the delicious meals, lovingly prepared by the
respective ladies of the crew, went to waste as nobody could eat anything. I am still
close to nearly all of my crew, 20 or 30 years later.
I will never forget that during one of the races a very good friend of mine (RIP) on
another competing boat was swept overboard never to be found. Ceremonies were
held in his memory later at the Hong Kong Yacht Club and other places.
Busy as I was, I still remained very interested in birds and I constructed a huge bird
cage in our apartment by closing off the maid’s quarters which had an adjoining
little garden. The bird market in Kowloon is world famous and I had ample supplies
of exotic birds there. At one time I bought two magnificent multicoloured Chinese
pheasants, one of which fell off his branch into the pond and died on the first day.
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I returned it to the seller, a gentile old Chinese who looked at me and gave me the
following priceless reason, “You are gweilo (foreigner) and bird not know gweilo, only
Chinese, so he see you and get heart attack.” This was one of the funniest things
I had ever heard but I did not get my money back.
I made many friends during these days and some of my sailing buddies like Henk
Stijweg, Mark van Ogtrop, Eduard van Voorst, Michel X (until his death) etc. are still
close friends. I met Henk for the first time in Hong Kong at the Mandarin Hotel bar,
my usual hang out place in those days. I gave him my Cartier business card which
was made from thin metal and was gold plated. Although I asked him to return it
many times (I only had a very limited supply of these cards), he never gave it back
to me and as far as I know he still keeps it somewhere – Henk, when you read this,
please give it back to me, it is a dear memory of a crazy time in my life.
Maybe my best friend ever was a man I met on the Shek O golf course on Hong
Kong Island, Prof Dr Henk Tideman (RIP) a world-famous maxillofacial surgeon
who was working at the Medical University of Hong Kong. On one occasion at the
Shek O golf course, Henk intervened during a most unpleasant occasion. We were
playing with a local Dutch banker called Lucas W. He was an arrogant, but otherwise
pleasant enough fellow, but lacked the kind of humour that Dutch golfers display
when they play together. When missing a putt during a particular game, I jokingly
told him, “Take a Mulligan.” This incited such an explosion of anger in him, that he
hit me in the face, upon which I naturally grabbed him by his throat, ready to smack
back. Fortunately, Henk prevented the incident becoming a full-blown scandal and
later, during a lunch in the Hong Kong club to which he had invited me, Lucas
hesitantly apologised for his unacceptable behaviour. I helped Henk build his house
in Phuket and stayed close friends with him for more than 20 years (he also moved
to Phuket after retirement, and we saw each other a few times per week). Henk had
the intellectual mind and I was the practical one, and we understood each other
perfectly. Alas, he got very ill a few years ago and I had the sad honour to be the one
to close his eyes, one of the saddest moments in my life. His wife Marion stayed here
in Phuket, and we are still in close contact.
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Prof Dr Henk Tideman and me on the golf course
Sailing was my greatest hobby and we had lots of races around the Hong Kong Yacht
Club. At that time I still wanted to look young and regularly dyed my steadily greying
head to a sexy dark blond, or so I thought. The strong sun and seawater meant that
no colour would stay the same. After each race my head would have a shiny red glow
and I acquired the nickname ‘Eric the Redhead’. I tried to remedy this by going to
the (ladies’) barber shop twice a week. I might have had a streak of premenopausal
anxiety in those days!
During a Dutch regional golf meeting in Manila, I met with Jhr Patrick Testa, another
well-known Dutchman, who had a large circle of business friends in Holland. We
knew each other already from our student years and I asked him if he was interested
in helping me to sell my package of real estate in The Hague. Within two weeks he
found a buyer: an obscure, rather unsavoury Yugoslavian who bought the whole lot
for cash delivered in a big suitcase. Although I made a very nice profit on the deal
(and Patrick a hefty commission), if I still had the package now it would be worth 10
times more. Alas, the story of my life is that I nearly always become impatient and
make deals too quickly and break out of them too early (this could be true of my
marriage with Anne Marie as well?).
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I will never forget that we met with this Mafioso character in the small office of
Amro bank (now ABN AMRO) in The Hague. He appeared with a suitcase full of
cash that took some time to count as at that time Holland’s highest denomination
of bank notes was a 1,000 guilders (paper money) note. I suppose nowadays banks
would have some trouble with accepting a large load of cash without investigating its
origin. However, at the bank, the manager, who went by the name of Koemans, did
ask him, “Sir, without being impolite, can you tell me how you got so much money
together?” He replied, “I worked hard and made a lot of money, especially with a few
brothels at home and your amazing and generous country spending foreign aid in
Eastern Europe. Everything I trade in is subsidised by your wonderful foreign aid tax
money.” To say Mr Koemans and his staff were non-plussed is an understatement.
So, life was very good. I had plenty of money and was comfortable getting involved
in the China real estate deal.
My parents’ Golden (50th) Wedding Anniversary, Hotel Cipriani, Venice, 1980
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My parents’ 55th wedding anniversary with their seven sons, Park Hotel, Vitznau,
Switzerland, 1990
55th wedding anniversary, with their sons and grandchildren, Park Hotel, Vitznau,
Switzerland, 1990
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My brother Robert’s 70th birthday celebrations at his amazing summer house with one of the
best views on the Cote d’Azur. From left: Francis, Robert, Maurice, Eric, Lou, Harry, Seven.
Roquebrune, summer 2004
I was travelling all over the place and almost never home. Anne Marie, with the
three children in boarding schools or university, became restless and our marriage
started to deteriorate. So, she decided to take some months leave from Hong Kong
and attend art courses at the Leiden University in Holland. In the meantime, I was
using my time to take care of my investments and the food business.
During this time, I came across a unique opportunity to buy one of the first built
convertible Rolls-Royce’s (a blue Corniche) after the war, which turned out to be the
oldest one in Hong Kong and of course attracted considerable attention – something
I did not find unattractive to say the least. For a number of years, I was the driver
who picked up ‘Sinterklaas’ (a Dutch national figure something like Santa Claus)
from Aberdeen Harbour (Hong Kong) to the Dutch Consul’s residence. Sinterklaas
was always played by ‘Bolle’ van Ginkel (RIP) a well-known (and fat) Dutch expat
who kept a bottle of Genever under his robe from which he took a regular nip to
soothe his nerves. ‘Bolle’ actually hated these small kids who had to sit on his knee
and, many a time, were so anxious that they peed on his toga, but he had the figure
and the looks to play this role each year. He also promised each kid a solid gold
bicycle much to the great dismay of their parents. Once on the way back it started to
rain and I closed my roof not realising that the properly inebriated Sinterklaas had
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unscrewed his two-metre-long ceremonial staff, the sharp end of which went straight
through my very expensive roof (I still hear the cracking sound). This became a
famous story as one of Holland’s most popular comedians, Youp van het Hek, wrote
a column (hilarious for everyone else, but for me sarcastic) about this event in the
Dutch newspaper, the NRC Handelsblad, describing me as a Dutchman who married
rich, with a coloured moustache (the nasty, ungrateful SOB as, in my function as
Chairman of the Dutch Association that year, I put him up and feted him for the
whole time he stayed in Hong Kong!)
Me and Sinterklaas (Bolle van Ginkel (RIP)) – the drivers’ uniform borrowed (with thanks)
from the Mandarin Hotel
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Driving Sinterklaas around Hong Kong
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I do not know when it started but many, many years ago (probably about 40 years
ago) I bought a Panama hat which suited me so well that, to this day, I always wear a
Panama hat, and now have a collection of 50 or more. Because of my quite noticeable
car as well (although Hong Kong is known as having the most Rolls-Royces per
square mile in the world) I became known as Mr Whitehead. Later, when I started
my art business in Hong Kong, this paid off handsomely as I became known as a
slightly eccentric person to say the least. My Rolls was a convertible so, after I started
my art business, I could use it to load large paintings for delivery to clients.
My employers at the time, the Friesland Farmers’ Cooperative, called CCF (where
a Volvo was considered extravagant), became aware of my unusual behaviour. Sure
enough, during one of my six-monthly visits to head office I was asked to see the
personnel manager who went by the name of Sjouke B. After some small talk he
came to the point by asking me hesitantly, “Eric, I heard some rumours that you
are driving around in a R…r…r…r…Rolls-Royce in Hong Kong, is that true?” (in the
farmer’s world, even a Volvo was seen as being Peyton Place). I told him, “Yes that is
true, but it is an antique car and I love taking care of old cars, so I spend most of
my weekends under the car repairing whatever breaks down.” I presumed he was
satisfied with that remark because he congratulated me on my interesting hobby,
however back in Hong Kong I received the following fax:
“Dear Eric, as you have such an interesting hobby do your mind writing an article
for our corporate journal (named with the highly original name, Wij In de Wei, which
translates to ‘We in the Cowfield’) about your unusual hobby and sending us some
pictures?” (Later on they changed the name of the magazine!)
Initially, I was quite shocked and did not know what to do about this but, in the end,
I sent them pictures and a story about antique cars with me on a roller plank in a
dirty overall, full of grease, half under the car. The article proved a success and I got
various requests from other car amateurs to help them but left these unanswered
and that was the end of that story. A few years later, when I moved to Phuket, I sold
the Rolls-Royce to Pier’s father-in-law, Nick Smith, the ‘Rupert Murdoch of New
Zealand’, who truly was an antique car collector. A few months later he told me that
he had sent the car for restoration to a garage and they found more Chinese-made
spare parts than original Rolls-Royce ones!
Upon reflection I think it was quite strange how quickly I adapted to this new job so
far away from the glamour of Cartier and the publicity I was used to. How I enjoyed
staying in the simple Oranje Hotel when in Friesland, and not in the Ritz on the
Place Vendôme. (In my mind I always called it the Imperial Oranje Hotel to make the
place more palatable in my new life.) Also, I loved my job now, business was growing
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exponentially in China, and Hong Kong remained my playground. Our imports
from Belgium became so big that I was rewarded with the decoration of Chevalier
of the Order of Leopold II by the prime minister of Belgium during one of his visits
to Hong Kong. In a speech at the Belgian consulate, he said, “If you sell more in
the future, I can even make you a Baroneke (Little Baron).” Belgium still hands out
nobility titles to well-deserving individuals to this day.
Receiving the “Chevalier of the Order of Leopold II” from the prime minister of Belgium at
my penthouse in Hong Kong
One time I was sent to Bangladesh and asked to quote for some 500 tons of
fertilizer which were produced by Shell in Pernis (Holland) and at a price which
was subsidized 50% by the Dutch government. I quoted this extremely favourable
price to the Director of a Bangladesh Government’s purchasing department, but he
decided to buy a similar fertilizer from Morocco for three times the price and paid
for by Dutch Development aid. The difference, most probably, was divided amongst
the local officials through kickbacks. This was the last straw for the then Dutch
ambassador who was so disgusted with the total corruption in the whole system,
that he asked the Dutch Government for reassignment. I still remember his name:
John van Sinninghe Damst – a very nice gentleman, who had previously been the
deputy ambassador at the Dutch Embassy in Indonesia. This is an example of the
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‘politics’ in various countries I experienced when I was working with Friesland.
Neither Friesland, nor myself, were ever involved in any such dealings, but these are
the games which we maybe were supposed to play – much to my displeasure. But not
with food aid. In this respect I remember that one night the GM of my Dhaka hotel
invited me to a nightly activity in the garden of his hotel: the cook would throw the
buckets of leftover food over a high wall behind which a large group of people were
waiting, howling and screaming to fight for these leftovers. I will never forget those
haunting sounds.
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CHAPTER EIGHT
Hong Kong and My Career as
an International Art Dealer
At home, in the Penthouse, Hong Kong
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With my Renoir circa 1999
It was not much later when Anne Marie left for Holland, fed up with my behaviour,
to study Art at Leiden University and I met the third important lady in my life,
Elisabeth Cassegrain. I was standing in the line for check-in at the Cathay Pacific
counter desk when I saw this beautiful blonde in front of me also checking in for the
same destination: Manila. Within a few minutes we were talking, and on the plane
I got to know her a little bit better. I recognised her face from the many pictures
published of her in the Hong Kong lifestyle media, such as Tatler. She was one of the
most photographed socialites in Hong Kong at that time and she obviously loved all
the attention. And so did I.
The Cassegrain family is one of the wealthiest families in France as her father,
Alain Cassegrain (RIP), started a leather goods business after the war together with
his brother Philippe (RIP). Unfortunately, as happens in many successful families,
the older brother Philippe bought out other family members including Alain for a
relatively low price. Nowadays the Longchamp brand, which was so named by the
two brothers because of their love for horse racing, has become one of the world’s
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top brands in luxury goods with over 200 boutiques worldwide. Alas, poor Elisabeth
to her great chagrin (although she pretended to be part and parcel of this family),
would never see a share in a future massive inheritance. Anyway, for me she had,
or so I thought, all the elements for a successful alliance (her social connections
brought me back to my Cartier time) and our relationship, which actually started
after Manila, grew into a fully-fledged affair whilst Anne Marie was in Europe. She
has one lovely daughter from a previous marriage, Marine, with whom I have recently
(and due to writing this book) been able to re-establish contact with. Marine is now
married and still living very happily in Hong Kong with her husband and beautiful
young daughter. During the time I spent with her mother, Marine was a large part of
my life and we had a wonderful relationship at the time with many good memories.
I am very happy we are in contact again.
With Elisabeth in the Penthouse, Hong Kong. Paintings from left: S. Ruysdael,
Pieter de Hooch, Jean Dufy
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Preparing the dining table
Out on the town with Marine
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Marine with her beautiful family
With Marine in Phuket, April 2006
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One of Elisabeth’s top qualities was being a highly talented organiser of our social
life, and for my 60th birthday she organised a three-day long party for me in Beijing,
culminating in a black-tie dinner on the Great Wall of China. This was organised by
one of her friends who was the general manager of one of the leading 5-star hotels in
Beijing: the Palace Hotel. He somehow got permission to organise this black-tie party
on the only fully restored part of the wall, some 100 miles outside of Beijing, reserved
for visiting foreign VIPs. More than 150 people attended, and all were bussed from
Beijing and stayed at the Palace Hotel. They were returned after midnight, again
by bus, now properly inebriated and so able to withstand the (then) hardships of
the China roads. I remember my mother being carried up on the wall with a sixman
team of carriers in an ancient antique Chinese sedan chair. Elisabeth had also
hired a beautifully restored, old farmhouse (which as it happens was managed by
‘I Will Not Complain’ as a training centre) where dinner was held, together with
a band and many speeches. Through one of her contacts, Elisabeth had compiled
a small documentary film about my life in Hong Kong, where many of my friends
and business contacts were asked their opinion about me. The film is lost unless
Elisabeth can trace it and send it to me, but one of my good friends, a judge, when
asked, “What do you think about Eric Smulders?” replied with the legendary words,
“I don’t know but I believe he is in jail, already, for a long time”.
My 60th birthday – with my mother and my sons at the Great Wall of China
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My 60th birthday party venue on the Great Wall of China (actually the farm was restored
by Anthony Willoughby for his “Great Wall” training sessions)
Organising things was Elisabeth’s great talent, she even had blankets prepared in
advance for when the weather cooled down during dinner. She was the ultimate
perfectionist and it did get so cold that the blankets saved the evening. Unfortunately,
her perfectionist character was also the cause of many conflagrations with me, a
person who is completely disorganised and needs to be surrounded by secretaries to
remind him of his daily duties and clean up after his administrative messiness. On
the other hand, in financial affairs, I can remember every figure or balance sheet
that is in front of me and I can make instant decisions intuitively without doing too
much research just based on my common sense. As a matter of fact, even until now,
I have only one file in which my important papers are stored, including my last will
and testament (already signed by my three children as ‘OK’, to avoid an inheritance
mess later). Every year, on the 1st of January, I pull out all expired correspondence.
Even today, I will have to move heaven and earth to get some suitable pictures for
this less-than-always-exemplary life story.
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Some regrettable episodes that I have forgiven myself for, but never forgotten, have
been my ghastly treatment of my first wife Marijke, and the pain I caused Anne
Marie and Elisabeth through my unquestionably egoistical, self-pleasing behaviour,
etc. Marijke later remarried a successful hotelier, started her own real estate business
in Spain and had another successful son called Gordon. Patrick and Alex have always
been very close to their half-brother and he now runs a very successful international
business from Spain with his delightful Spanish wife.
I still question myself about my behaviour, because on the other hand I have a very
generous side to my character as, fortunately, people close to me would certify.
I would rather say: non, rien de rien, je ne regrette rien. After all, regrets are useless
sentiments because the past can never be changed – thanks Edith Piaf (Le Moineau)
for that wonderful song.
Gordon and family, from left: Ana Jr., Gordon, Gordon’s mother-in-law and Ana, Gordon’s wife
When Anne Marie was in Holland and first heard rumours about my goings-on with
Elisabeth, she returned quickly to Hong Kong but it was too late for me to give up
on Elisabeth. Anne Marie stayed in our apartment, and I moved in with Elisabeth
(her apartment was one quarter of the size). After a number of months of moving
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ack and forth between the two ladies and with regular interventions by my son Alex
(who lived nearby) emotions got out of hand. Anne Marie finally gave up on me,
packed up and returned to Holland – a sad story.
As a result of all of this, my stress levels became so high that after consultation
with my sons, I went to Sierra Tucson (Arizona) for two months, to a famous
addiction and depression treatment centre similar to the Betty Ford Institute but
even more exclusive and expensive ($2,500 US per day). For eight weeks I followed
all the courses, meditations, sharing and medications that were offered. I soon
realised that depression was a redline that ran historically through some of my
family and can be treated with the proper medication and attention. Even now,
after many years, I still take my daily Prozac to prevent a relapse. Because of the
centre’s price and exclusivity some my co-patients were famous movie stars and
industrialists, one of whom became a great friend (RIP). He was the chairman of
a US conglomerate and had been forced by his sons to enter the same treatment
programme: the reason for this was that he had knocked out a police officer when
he was stopped for drunk driving.
Upon registration everybody receives a code name and you are sworn to secrecy
about the other participants with a legally signed document. After a few interviews
I was allocated to three treatment groups: depression, sex addiction and alcoholism.
As most of my ‘colleagues’ were highly intelligent and sometimes extremely successful
people, I generally had a good time and made some great connections. The sex
addiction class especially was a great ‘meeting’ place because we all were there for the
same reasons; although any sexual activity was forbidden with a threat of immediate
termination (also called a relapse).
I remember one of my friends was a Brazilian and a top official at the United Nations
in Geneva, Switzerland. When asked about his different sexual encounters (when
more than five was already considered total addiction by US standards) he said, to
the great hilarity of everybody else in our group, “Well, at least a few thousand.”
Another one I remember was, and still is, a famous movie star who confessed that
he had a caravan equipped with a very luxurious bedroom behind his convertible
Cadillac so he could pick up ladies in his Hollywood hunting grounds. Meeting all
these characters was an unforgettable experience for me. I left after six weeks having
made the decision to stay with Elisabeth and split from Anne Marie which removed
the major cause of stress and depression. So, from there I went back to Hong Kong
‘cured’ and with a lifelong prescription of Prozac.
After amicably signing a separation agreement, Anne Marie returned to Holland
where she started a successful interior decoration business in Wassenaar with her
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est friend Jkvr Floep Mak van Waay (an ex-girlfriend of my brother Robert – which
he always denied). Holland seems very small, right?
So, until today I remain officially married to her but legally separated, which gave her
the great advantage of receiving her monthly ‘housekeeping’ allowance, tax free. We
are still on very good terms sharing our youngest son, Pier, and her ‘adopted’ sons,
Alex and Patrick, and all of our grandchildren (now 10 in number and still growing!).
They have always been a mutually vital shared interest.
Anizy Castle in the Bourgogne
In the meantime, Elisabeth’s father had bought a wonderful old Castle in the
Bourgogne called Anizy, originally from the 12th century, probably with the money
he received for selling his shares in Longchamp. For many years he renovated the
buildings (the moats, the church, etc.) with great dedication and consideration
for their original state. Elisabeth had one sister, Veronique, who was married to a
wealthy French banker, and so her father very smartly donated the castle to his two
daughters with a droit d’usage (right of usage) for his life. Suddenly, the two sisters
(thus also me) were responsible for the maintenance and staffing of the property.
Elisabeth’s parents had even built a large, heated swimming pool building, all financed
by me and my brother-in-law, who they considered to be their walking ATMs.
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So, my life continued in Hong Kong now with a new partner and her small daughter.
Reflecting on this now, I wonder how much less complicated and stressful my life
would have been if I would have just kept my zipper closed and stayed with Anne
Marie? But, alas…
I enjoyed my favourite city, Hong Kong; I loved the many black-tie balls, parties
and receptions to which Elisabeth continued to be invited. In some way we were a
strange couple with me running my businesses, playing golf and sailing, and Elisabeth
running the Garard and Asprey boutiques.
It was around the year 2000 that my real estate development in Beijing started to
face lots of (cheaper) local competition from Chinese developers who built similar
estates all around my own, between Beijing city and the airport. Also, during this
time Shell had withdrawn most of its oil exploration executives from China as no
major oilfields were found.
I was now expected to look for local expatriates who only wanted fully furnished
accommodation. This was a major complication because, every month, new tenants
came in and wanted all kind of changes and renewals. On top of this the local
Chinese competition had driven rental prices down and the Chinese government
became more and more restrictive with its regulations on foreign ownership. A non-
Chinese could only own one property which forced me to create a separate legal
corporate entity for every unit, be it apartment or house (in my case multi BVIs)
which became a huge administrative and accounting nightmare. So, I now decided
it was time to sell, and again I did it for a tidy profit. However, if I would have kept
these properties for another 10 years, they would have increased in value by five to 10
times as real estate prices escalated to similar levels as Hong Kong. Again, the story
of my life: buy on impulse, sell too early!
I had enough money to continue my more-than-pleasant life, and Elisabeth introduced
me to a famous architect who had built several of the Aman Puri resorts around Asia,
the world’s first 6-star resorts. His name was Jean-Michel Gathy and he proposed a
small exclusive project to me in Phuket, Thailand, right across from the original
Aman Puri Hotel. It was some five miles by sea away, on a rock point with a 270
degrees sea view over Kamala Bay. This project (now called Laemson Villas, Kamala)
was supposed to become the ‘mini’ Aman resort. I immediately jumped upon his
ideas as the location was unique and I would be working with a world-famous
architect who had already prepared the basic plans for seven large, new, Aman-style
houses. The Aman Puri Hotel was forced to sell this project to the Bangkok Bank
(a stock market listed bank with the major shareholding held by the Sophonpanich
family) because they had defaulted on their real estate loans during the Asian crisis.
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I knew the chairman of the group, one of the best-known figures in Thailand, Khun
Chai Sophonpanich, as I used to give big dinner parties in Bangkok in the Oriental
Hotel to sell the Cartier baubles and other Cartier creations, where his family was
also always invited. Within a few days we had agreed on a deal and I bought a house
there, as did my son Patrick, who bought the house next to me so we could visit each
other with our (now) own private beaches.
The building and completion of the project took around seven years and required
my regular presence on the site. During this time, after retirement from Friesland
and the selling of my Beijing real estate project, I finally realised my dream: I could
now become an international art dealer. I was lucky to find a wonderful place in
central Hong Kong which was undergoing a real estate crisis, and soon opened the
Master Paintings Gallery which I stocked with old masters, impressionist works and
more modern artists. We regularly gave cocktail parties and exhibitions, which were
masterfully organised by Elisabeth as well as black-tie dinner parties in the Mandarin
Hotel. Business was profitable, seeing regular sales of important works. My first
important sale was to a Dutch banker friend, a marine by Bakhuizen. He had the
extraordinary name, Willem Pijpers (RIP) whose wife soon got the nickname ‘Befje’,
a not very polite, Dutch play on words.
The Master Paintings Gallery actually became the most important art gallery in Hong
Kong due to the fact that, with the more-than-sufficient funds in my possession,
I bought a sizeable collection of wonderful art works from Sotheby’s, Christie’s and
Bonhams over the years: famous names such as Rachel Ruysch, Breughel, Jan Steen (sold
to my architect Jean-Michel Gathy), Bellevois, Lucas van Leyden and impressionists like
Renoir (one), Georges d’Espagnat (still two in my house), De Vlaminck, Dufy, etc. My son
Alex still has some of my paintings, a Breughel, a still life with the ubiquitous lobster
by Rachel Ruysch and a large 17th century marine by Bellevois, etc., on loan.
Dealing in major paintings is quite a challenge in Hong Kong where my customers,
mainly Chinese, really had no idea about this type of art. Once, one of Hong Kong’s
most famous businessmen, Sir Ka-shing Li GBM KBE JP (to give him his full title)
came in surrounded by his bodyguards and asked me if I could repaint a 17th
century large marine painting. I politely declined. On another occasion I had sold
a painting to a Chinese client; a beautiful Italian landscape painting (attributed to
Oreste Albertini) with the usual river in the middle to determine the horizon on the
painting. The next day he asked me to take the painting back because it brought him
bad luck. I went to his house and he showed me the painting on his wall telling me,
“The river looks like it flows out of my window and because water means money
for the Chinese this is extremely bad luck as all my money goes out of the window.”
I convinced him to keep the painting saying, “Look at that little fisherman on the side
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of the river. He sits on the right, and this means the water is going from right to left
otherwise he would’ve been sitting on the other side. Indeed, in that case the water
would have gone out of your window, but not now. So, don’t worry, in this painting
the river streams into your house which will bring in more and more money.” He was
very happy with this explanation and as far as I know, he is still enjoying the picture.
On another occasion we participated in the Taiwan International Art Fair. I was assisted
by Mark Grol who worked for a year for me in the art business as he had just graduated
from art school in Holland. We managed to sell a large Eugène Boudin to a local dentist
which was fortunate as it was only 60% of the original picture as part of it had been
burnt (except for the signed part), but it had been professionally restored and beautifully
framed in Hong Kong. In the catalogue raisonné of the artist there was an original picture
of this painting which we showed to the client to prove that our painting was officially
registered as work by the artist. Mark had a brilliant idea to convince the buyer that part
of the picture being burnt was actually a sign of good luck, because the previous owners’
house had survived 90% of the same fire and they had kept the painting in the family
for a few hundred years as symbol of good luck. Fortunately, the unburnt part had the
original signature and the client agreed to buy this ‘masterpiece’. That night, Mark went
to the dentist’s house who gave us cash ($125,000 US compared to my purchase price
of around $22,000 US – we had to make some profit, right?) and Mark personally hung
the painting in the dentist’s living room, where I presume it still is. I must have been a
good teacher because a few years later Mark became first auctioneer and later managing
director of Sotheby’s and is still a good friend of mine.
Delivering a Bellevois painting (1631–1676) with my favourite driver, Lito (note the
numberplate with my initials helping to advertise Master Paintings Gallery)
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Hong Kong Dutch Chamber – “COBRA” Exhibition
at Master Paintings Gallery – Opening 1999
I had another assistant during those days, a beautiful young lady called Carole, the
sister of my son’s (now ex) wife, Noelle. We worked together very amicably for a few
years until she left because she could not stand Elisabeth’s constant intrusions into
the workings of the art gallery. Elisabeth had developed her own business selling
antique Mongolian rugs for which she regularly travelled to inner Mongolia, to visit
the locals in their yurts. She assembled a wonderful collection of these rare rugs
which have become extremely expensive now: if they can still be found. However,
she insisted on selling them through my gallery, which created many mini explosions
between her, Mark and Carole. Elisabeth was a perfectionist, which by definition
required only perfection, which is impossible in a large gallery. In the end both Mark
and Carole resigned. I closed the gallery with an extremely successful sale. This was
advertised with a quarter-page advert on the front page of the South China Morning
Post and included a picture of me and the words: “Everything is for sale, including
me.” (I followed this up with a second advert once the gallery closed, thanking
everyone who had visited and bought from me.) This did not suit Elisabeth’s sense
of humour: she was very upset that I put myself publicly ‘up for sale’. Actually, I had
many very positive reactions and some (mock?) proposals. Everything was sold with
the exception of a small number of my best paintings which I either kept, or were
sold through Sotheby’s and Christie’s, thereby closing this chapter of my life in Hong
Kong. The time had come to move permanently to Phuket.
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Master Gallery Hong Kong closing down sale, China Post
With my favourite dog, Anizy (RIP), after an evening hobbying in Hong Kong
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Around this time, and just following my mother’s 100th birthday celebrations (in
2008) held in Kasteel, Braschaat, I flew, on Patrick’s private plane, with Patrick, his
wife Kiki and baby Tristan, plus Alex and Pier, from Antwerp to London so that
we four guys could fly on to Antigua the following day. Alex, Pier and Patrick had
offered me a week of sailing on a wonderful exploration yacht called Carl Linne which
belonged to a friend of Patrick (named in honour of the 18th Century Swedish
biologist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus, known as a father of modern
ecology), so that I could celebrate my upcoming 70th birthday alone with my sons –
our version of a boys-only vacation. We had an amazing week, not only exploring the
various Dutch and English islands, diving and fishing, but primarily having lots of
amazing times, simply ‘hanging out’ with each other.
Partying with my sons on our “boys only holiday”
prior to my 70th birthday, Antigua, 2008
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Enjoying an alcohol drenched dinner. From left: me, Patrick, Pier and Alex
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CHAPTER NINE
“Happy Retirement” in Phuket
Now I spent time travelling between Phuket and Hong Kong managing the
building of my house, which actually took around seven years. Elisabeth
hated Phuket as a permanent residence and would only join me for some weekends.
With all this spare time on my hands and, as usual, being curious about local
business opportunities, I met two Norwegians called Bjorn Moller (RIP) and
Fredrik Gromer who convinced me to build the first beach club in Phuket on
Bang Tao beach. I thought this was a great idea and I financed the building of an
amazing club with a pink swimming pool, right on the sea in what was possibly
the best location in Phuket, at the corner of Bang Tao Beach and the Aman
Puri. However, after two years planning and building, I discovered that the two
had conspired to steal most of my money and lied about the progress of all the
construction work, and orders placed and paid for by me to contractors. To make
a long story short, for the first time in my life, I was cleverly cheated out of some
$600,000 US. I tried to sue the two rascals but they both fled the island. Even
now the remains of what was going to be a pink swimming pool can still be seen
in the corner of Bang Tao beach.
So, I actually spent most of my time alone in Phuket where I had a very good
friend called Ole Schistad, who, in his last post, was ambassador for Norway in
Singapore. We became close friends and spent many weekends together fishing
on my boat. He had a large circle of local and international friends as he was
a most likeable and intelligent person. During a dinner party at his house he
introduced me to a scion from a leading family in Phuket called Uraiphan Saesin
– ‘Oe’ would eventually become the fourth important woman in my life – who
ran a number of successful real estate businesses in Phuket. She was (and still is)
a beautiful, well-dressed, elegant Thai lady and I was duly impressed and tried to
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make a date with her. She first refused as, due to my inclination to dress quite
colourfully, she thought I was gay! But I managed quite quickly to convince her of
the opposite after I invited her for dinner on my boat. I pretended to have cooked
(actually, it was pre-cooked) a meal but my cover was blown when the microwave
oven exploded.
My relationship with Elisabeth grew more and more problematic as she absolutely
refused to come and live in Phuket, and Hong Kong, for me personally, had
become a past station in my life. My frequent trips to Thailand in the meantime
became a major obstacle in our relations as Elisabeth did not like, in fact she
hated, the nightlife and my so-called vibrant social life in Phuket. Elisabeth,
brilliant as she was in these matters, quickly acquired a group of local friends,
the majority of whom I liked as well. However, I also had my boating, golfing and
bar friends who did not exactly fit her taste and whom she called my ‘marginals’,
but they were my real buddies with whom I had fun, did my sports, went diving,
fishing and occasionally, of course, clubbing. Also, when we were together, I was
generally on my boat and poor Elisabeth hated boats as she became seasick just
by looking at one. Phuket was not a notable high society place in which she
could blossom, so we grew apart more and more which caused stress and sadness
because she was one of the loves of my life, but as the famous expression goes:
‘A dog only leaves his basket when he has another one to go to’, and I now had
one in Phuket. At my 70th birthday party, I appeared dressed as Rudyard Kipling
riding on an elephant. For two days we had an amazing time with all my mostly
local friends and all of my six brothers present. At the end of the second day,
Elisabeth made my staff clean all the floors of my house with Dettol and this
was the last drop which made the proverbial bucket overflow (I still see them
scrubbing on their knees), and we finally broke up the day after.
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With my beautiful life partner, Oe, in Laemson
169

Oe (Uraiphan Saesin) – my very loving life partner and her entrepreneurial father
New Year’s Eve, Times Square, New York, 2012
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Off to a fancy dress party, 2021
I soon faced the return of my depressive moods as the stress caused by, once
again, having to choose between two ladies became unbearable (history repeats
itself). Whilst on holiday in New Zealand with Oe to visit Pier and his family,
I consulted with Patrick, Alexander and Pier and decided to return once more,
(yes you can guess, maybe as an escape) to Sierra Tucson. However, this place had
changed dramatically since I had been there some years before as now it was a
public company (PLC) with a very clear profit goal and was no more the caring
institution as I remembered it. There were some excellent doctors specialising in
medication for depressive illnesses though, and I soon found the right combination
of ‘effective brain pills’ including, of course, Prozac which cleared up my brain in
a few weeks. There, I also got to know one of the world’s top golfers whom I could
even now call by his first name.
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Parachute jumping in New Zealand
Certificate for leaping 630ft from the Sky Tower, Auckland, New Zealand
172

I returned from Sierra Tucson and stuck to my decision to make a clean break with
Elisabeth, including a rather generous financial offer (remember ‘the dog and his
two baskets’), and returned to Phuket and decided to continue my life with Oe
permanently.
These ladies in my life came at a very substantial cost (Eigen Schuld Dikke Bult). As a
matter of fact, Anne Marie is still on my ‘payroll’ as of today and Elisabeth, amongst
others, ‘court cased’ me out of my 300m2 Hong Kong flat on The Peak, worth some
$5 million-plus US today. She also disposed of around 50 suits, shoes, etc., and sold
my collection of Hermès ties through Sotheby’s New York. I had all their ties in
my collection from the first design onwards (remember I was instrumental in the
creation of one of the first Hermès boutiques outside of France, in Hong Kong).
Before my Laemson house was finished, I usually stayed in a house in Kamala
right on the sea in a small compound called Kamala Beach Estate, which at the
time was owned by my brother Seven, or on my boat. In the evenings there were a
lot of things to do which I liked; especially socialising with the many new friends
I met through the art business (most of them called les margineaux de Eric – Eric’s
marginals) by Elisabeth.
When I retired in Kamala, I also became quite proficient in snooker. Myself on the left with
the hat and the blue suit and snooker champion Elle with her US, ex-marine husband
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Also a few hundred metres from the house was a wonderful little bar called
Mountain View where I spent many a night sipping my Ketel vodka and enjoying
the atmosphere created by the many expats working or retired around Kamala.
With their expert guidance I also became quite proficient in snooker. The bar’s
owner was a formidable woman called Elle, married, or semi-married, to an ex-
GI from Vietnam who entertained us with many of the GI songs she knew by
heart. All such pleasant pastimes made me forget that I lived mostly alone in
Phuket. In the meantime, the construction of Laemson Villas (Pine Point in Thai)
was riddled with problems as several contractors went bankrupt or refused to
continue working on this very difficult and rocky site. Also, from Kamala there
was no road to Laemson except a sandy path of some three kilometres. One night,
while worrying about the whole project, specifically that when it rained this road
was only passable for four-wheel-drive trucks, I hit upon an idea: why not approach
a number of European embassies in Bangkok as they usually have infrastructure
budgets?
Home – Laemson Villa 1, Kamala, Phuket
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“Living in Paradise” – Article from Elsevier Magazine, June 2019
So, after being introduced to several ambassadors by, amongst others, my brother
Seven who already knew many people in the diplomatic service (from his previous
job as Director of the Netherlands Council for Trade Promotion – NCH) and Ulle,
my Norwegian friend and ex-diplomat, I went to work trying to convince them that
there was a wonderful infrastructure project in Phuket worth investing in. To make
a long story short I was finally successful as one embassy agreed to commit their
remaining budget for the year to build a paved road from Kamala to Laemson,
which later became known as Millionaire’s Mile. A few years later this road was
extended by the Thai government to make a big loop and connect again to the main
road from Patong to Kamala and all this from a generous country’s development
aid budget. Bingo! The road was built quite quickly and my construction problems
were mostly solved as big trucks could now be used to move all the rocks and build
our houses.
When I was not busy with the galleries and the construction project, I found
time to replace my small 38ft boat Nong Nuch with a new, much larger ship, a
Riviera 48, built in Australia and considered as one of the finest brands on the
market. I named the boat OSU 5 (the four boats I owned before were the Horny
Cat, a trimaran called Tri Again Three, the Luo Shen and the Nong Nuch) which was
fully equipped for deep sea fishing, trawling and as a ‘live aboard’ with four airconditioned
bedrooms. The name OSU is a Japanese war cry, used by me and my
children to this day as a form of greeting.
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So, I flourished in Phuket, started a new art gallery group called Soul of Asia which
at one point expanded to seven different locations in the various top hotels in the
area. Since the start of this enterprise, I employed a wonderful (and at that time
very young) lady called Moddang who was instrumental in helping me to start up
this growing, but for the most part loss-making venture; my hobby. Moddang is
still with me after 15 years and we have a great relationship. She also serves as my
private secretary, knows all, or most, of my little secrets, and I hope this wonderful
relationship will continue for a long time. However, as is my character, I have a
kind of buying addiction and soon filled those galleries with beautiful artefacts,
antiques, Buddhas and paintings. I later realised Phuket was not the right place for
art galleries as most tourists come here for fun and not for buying art. There is (and
became worse with Covid-19) not enough demand to keep the galleries profitable.
While some people have private planes and others have concubines or mianois (little
wives), I have spent my money on my art hobby. A better (though maybe not as
pleasant) way to SKI (spend kids’ inheritance)?
So today, at the time of telling my story, I am the happy owner of a few hundred
paintings, many Buddhas and other antiques which are not easy to sell, and in the
end, I presume my children will have to solve my stock problems as I don’t want to
close the galleries, which I love and keep me busy.
Another memorable event from this period was my 80th birthday party. For this
occasion, I had not only invited my whole family but also all my old friends who
were still alive from my time in Asia, including my student-year club. The event was
held in a 5-star beach hotel in Noordwijk near Amsterdam called the Grand Hotel
Huis Ter Duin. It was a black-tie, two-day affair, where I arrived by helicopter onto
the field where the reception was held. This whole event was masterly organised by
a famous, stunning blonde Dutch ballet dancer called Annette Wijdom, who was
a friend of my brother Robert’s and was recommended by him. (Annette founded
the Fa Fa International Showdancers in 1987, who regularly perform at the Moulin
Rouge in Paris and around the world.)
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Me at my art galleries – Soul of Asia, Surin and Bang Tao, Phuket, Thailand
177

My beautiful staff when Soul of Asia had more than ten outlets in Phuket hotels (again, all
were closed after one year as we had no sales...)
Annette Wijdom – creator and hostess of my 80th birthday party in Noordwijk
178

At my 80th birthday
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A few years ago, I sold my boat, the OSU 5 and bought a large 51ft catamaran called
the OSU 6 with four air-conditioned bedrooms and fully equipped for fishing. The
OSU 5 had provided me with wonderful recreation and for a few years I organised
monthly ‘fishing trips’ on the first Monday of each month, calling this venture
The Andaman Tuna Society, with the motto: ‘Everything happening on the boat
stays on the boat’. The rule was that anybody could bring a lady friend, but not his
wife (one German guy always brought a new boyfriend) which allowed all of us to
have uncontrolled fun, fuelled by ample supplies of alcohol. We never caught a fish
though, but our trips became legendary. One member was the famous sailor Henry
Kaye (Hoorray Henry, RIP) who would entertain us with his acerbic British sense
of humour and the amazing companions he brought with him. On one occasion a
Russian lady who came with him got so excited by seeing the open sea, probably for
the first time in her life, that she stripped in the front of the boat to loud applause of
the dozen or so Tuna Society members present on the upper deck.
In March 2012, together with Ulle, a German fishing fanatic called Walter and
another German (Hanz) and his wife (‘amply bottomed’; I’ll come to that), we made
a trip on the OSU 6 to the Andaman Islands some 500 miles away from Phuket,
just below Bombay. The trip was quite uneventful but not without danger as the
sea was full of little floating handmade bamboo objects used by regional fisherman
to drag nets around. With alert night watches and a good radar, we avoided all
these obstacles and whilst getting a lot of fish we arrived in Port Blair, the capital of
the Andaman Islands. The local authorities came on board and the first thing they
asked was, “Where are the girls?” as they were all strictly Muslim (but they still like
their booze) and suspected that we were carrying sinful ladies from Patong, as well
as other illegal cargo. The first thing they asked was if Hanz had a marriage licence
for his wife as otherwise he would be committing a criminal act called Iklat (close
together) which under Sharia law is a crime for which you are arrested. Fortunately,
she was mentioned in his passport which they grudgingly accepted though not
without argument. After a long discussion we promised them half of our catch
and gave them each two bottles of whisky and some money (euphemistically called
‘facilitation fees’ in many countries) with which their suspicions soon enough
evaporated.
Port Blair is a boring and dilapidated city without any bars, nightclubs or proper
restaurants. However, one incident stays in my mind: A Mr Singh, the Head
Inspector, fell in love with our captain, Anna, at that time an attractive young
Muslim man. In Anna’s presence Mr Singh asked me if Anna was for sale and if so
for how much? To Anna’s horror I told him yes, but for five million rupees. After
that, Anna never dared to leave the ship as he really believed he could be sold to
this bearded Sikh.
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After a few days in the harbour for refuelling, buying provisions, fresh water and
so on, we went back to sea for some amazing fishing and diving around the many
magnificent islands. I saw every big sea game from a pod of whales to huge groupers,
dolphins and sharks in many forms, including the first hammerhead shark I ever saw
in my life.
Happy retirement. My biggest Groupa EVER! 2021
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What a catch! My fishing success – not a catch during an Andaman Tuna Society outing!
But this one IS a catch during an Andaman Tuna Society outing! (Was the catch actually in
my right hand or in my left hand?)
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Happy retirement – relaxing at home with my dogs
One island we didn’t reach was the North Sentinel Island. We only got within
one mile as it was strictly forbidden to get closer. This was a historically notorious
island inhabited by cannibals who, to this day, will convert anybody they catch
into a 5-star dinner. As a matter of fact, after the tsunami of 2004, the Indian
government tried to help them, but they were shot at by arrows when they arrived
by helicopter. Only a few years ago according to the newspapers, a Protestant Pastor
ventured there on his own to try to convert the heathens, but he disappeared as
soon as he set foot on the island never to be heard from again. During the 17th
and 18th century, sailing ships going to the Far East stopped in front of this island
if they had any mutinous crew on board. They would deposit them on the island
where the waiting locals had prepared a large cooking party on the beach. In full
view of the ship’s crew, as a warning for bad behaviour, they would (slowly) cook
these poor souls into (probably) delicious meals (all this is recorded in the shipping
annals by the Dutch East India Company).
The return trip was uneventful, and we caught a lot of yellow fin tuna, some
sailfish and one small (50kg plus) marlin. All billfish were of course released but
the tuna made delicious sashimi. To the amusement of Ulle and myself, Walter’s
wife had a huge behind and Anna, our Muslim captain, was mesmerised by the
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sight of so much overflowing flesh from too-small-a-bikini. The rest of us preferred
to look the other way. After arriving in Phuket some five days later, we parted ways
with this quite unsavoury couple, never to meet again.
Another memorable event happened at the time when my great friend Mark van
Ogtrop ran the Dusit Laguna Beach Hotel as managing director. One day he asked
me to invite a number of our mutual friends to moor in front of the hotel. He
took care of a superb, hotel-made lobster dinner brought on board with sufficient
champagne to nearly sink the boat. Much later that night, a rather boisterous
group left the boat, crossing the grounds of the hotel to return to their respective
houses. One German guest got so irritated that she shouted from her balcony,
“Scheise ich kan nicht schlafen sonst rufe ich Herrn Director an” (“Shut up I can’t sleep
otherwise I’ll call Mr Director”) whereupon, Mark shouted the reply that has since
become a famous dictum amongst his colleagues worldwide, “You shut up, I am
the fucking GM!” Consequently, he had to deal with a highly excited German lady
first thing in the morning and appease her one way or another, but that was part
of his job after all.
During all my time in Asia I continually grew closer to my parents – we all grow
wiser as we grow older. I tried to visit them as much as I could, at least once every
two months. After my father passed away in 1997, I visited my mother nearly every
two or three weeks until the end of her life, by which time she was over 100 years
old and we would play scrabble together in three languages. The older she got, the
naughtier the words that she used, much to the great hilarity of us both.
I will never forget her voice on our last telephone conversation we had at around
12pm on the night she passed away, whispering, “Ekie, you must come now.” I left on
the first flight available but, alas, I arrived too late.
I often walked with my father in his large garden in Brasschaat, Belgium, which was a
few houses away from where my brother Maurice used to live. I regularly brought some
Han or Tang dynasty statue for him which he collected (my brother Seven inherited
the best one, an ultra-rare Tang Dynasty buffalo-drawn carriage). I remember one
day during one of our walks he spoke these wise words, which are becoming more
wise the older I get, “Do you know, one of the worst things about growing old is that
everything gets stiff, except where it should.” Wise words they prove to be, and surely
all my older brothers can vouch for this prophecy as well.
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My mother playing Scrabble, circa 2002
Another great couple of friends are Robert and Maggy Wigman. Robert was a retired
scientist and oenophile who, when he came to Phuket, decided to turn his hobby
into a business and started a company called Wine and Taste. One day, playing
golf, I suggested that I would take over the 50% share from his partner who had
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lost interest in the business, which I did. For some years I was a happy shareholder
in a quickly growing wine business which is now one of the major quality wine
suppliers on the island. However, a 50-50 partnership with one side doing nothing
and the other side doing all the work is not a sound business construction. After
a few years we decided on a friendly split. Now, thanks to Robert I have a solid
knowledge of wine and he has grown his business into the leading quality wine
supplier on the island. He made his hobby into his work, which is the secret to
success in business life.
I have not mentioned my wonderful brothers Lou and Harry because they both
live their lives so distanced from mine. Lou in the US and Harry in Belgium
and France. Lou is probably my most brilliant brother with a cum laude degree in
physics from Delft University. He has an extraordinary gift of knowing everything
about everything: from all the stars in the constellations by name (he is an avid
stargazer) to the smallest details of American and international politics. He now
lives happily with his wife, three daughters and numerous grandchildren in the
US. There is a rumour that because of his exceptional memory, he had, at one
time, his own dedicated invitation-only table at the casino in Monte Carlo and
other casinos around the world, for playing Baccarat. This he has always strongly
denied. So, whatever the truth is, it is an interesting observation on his intelligence.
Left to right: Robert, Maurice, Lou, me, Francis and Seven celebrating Lou’s 70th birthday,
Utah, USA
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Lou with his wife Titia and two of their grandchildren
In 2011, Lou and his wife, Titia, invited all their direct families for a five-day-long,
extremely generous bash in the US to celebrate his 70th birthday. While there,
we visited many of the wonderful sights in the region, including, amongst others,
Yellowstone National Park. All my brothers were there with the exception of Harry.
In the park I was nearly (and stupidly) killed by a wild buffalo on the road. Much
to the consternation of other travellers in the park, I got out of the car and touched
him, which was extremely unwise, and I hurriedly retreated. On returning to the
hotel, I saw a big sign which read, “If you see a buffalo never get out of your car as they
can be extremely dangerous.” I was a really stupid tourist with an amazing guardian
angel. These were wonderful memories and thank you again, Lou and Titia. We look
forward to your 80th birthday celebrations soon!
Harry is by far the funniest of all my brothers, whose practical jokes are still
remembered at every family meeting. He is a very special case. He graduated as an
economist (Nederlandsche Economische Hogeschool – NEH, Rotterdam) and passed
an MBA at INSEAD, Europe’s top business school in Fontainebleau, France. Harry
has led a multi-faceted entrepreneurial rollercoaster of a life in Belgium, where his
two daughters and son still live. In March 2011 he settled in south-western France
(Aquitaine) with his wife Marie-France, where they operate their very successful
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hospitality business based at his beautiful estate near Saint Emilion, Bordeaux. He is
a writer and ‘soul wake-up’ companion.
My brother Harry’s beautiful estate in St. Emilion, Bordeaux
With my brother Seven in Phuket, 2021
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Seven with his wonderful wife of 30 years, Oh
So, my life story now comes to an end after a rather tumultuous but often
interesting and exciting past, and I hope to spend the remainder of my years living
in Laemson 1 with Oe and all my buddies. I have found in my present partner
Oe a wonderful new basket where I still happily sleep up to this day. Oe, together
with her family, is now my very supporting and loving (fourth) life partner, and
she makes my life in Phuket even more pleasant. I am spending the autumn of my
life enjoying most of my hobbies: golfing, fishing, alcoholising (I am sure I am, as
most of my friends are, a happy geriatric alcoholic) and still occasionally, diving.
I am especially grateful to have my younger brother Seven living here, with whom
I play golf at least twice a week. Even if he gives me 36 shots, he still beats me as he
is a single handicap player. Also Nabil, another retired maxillofacial surgeon, Fred
Majoor my great friend, a retired, highly successful editor in Holland, Jan van
de Weg (or Jan de la Rue, or chiquer Jan de l’Avenue), who, amongst others, was
famous for playing the piano in Yab Yum, Holland’s first high-class sex club, Rene
Beerlage, Ben Beune (nicknamed ‘Ben Bonkers’ due to his numerous amorous
conquests), and many others who make my life here so exciting. I literally enjoy
every single day with all my non-marginaux and marginaux friends. There are of
course many other friends (far too many to mention) such as Michel and Sue
Arnulfy, John Magee, Kabir and Sonya Bandari (and more) with whom I spend
quality time fishing, golfing and sharing mutually alcoholic episodes.
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Whenever the end comes, as it must, you can come and say farewell to me in my
freezer coffin, lying on a block of ice (and ironically, I hate the cold) in Laemson
1, while my favourite tunes by Frank Sinatra play (“I’ve lived a life that’s full, I’ve
travelled each and every highway, but more, much more than this, I did it my way”),
Edith Piaf (“Non, rien de rien, non, je ne regrette rien, Ni le bien, qu’on m’a fait, tout ça m’est
bien égal”) and “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen.
I want to be cremated in the Kamala temple which, as we donated money for the
rebuilding of the temple after the tsunami in Phuket of 2004, has one pillar with
Oe’s and my name inscribed on it.
Yours affectionately,
Opa, Pappie, Eric
October 2021, Phuket
P.S. I refrained from mentioning the huge amount of stress and many sleepless nights that
accompanied most of the events in this book.
Kamala Temple – column plinth dedicated to me and Oe after helping with the Temple
restoration after the 2004 Tsunami, Phuket
190

Relaxing after a hard day’s fishing
Oe and myself, New Year’s Eve, 31 December 2020 (Khun Boot in the background left)
191

Oe and myself diving on a holiday in the Philippines, 2012
Me diving again in the Andaman Islands
192

Oe
My granddaughter Etoile who inherited my love for the sea and diving with a 43kg kingfish,
caught by herself and is the largest kingfish caught with a speargun off the coast of
New Zealand in the last three years!
193

The morning after the night before, after another wonderful evening spent with “my
marginals” in Phuket!
Family time with Pappie: Declan (Dutchy) fishing
194

Alex’s daughter Etoile and me at my birthday
Alex with Asia
195

Pier’s children – Beatrix, Mathilda and Freddie
196

Alex and Alice at Christmas time in Laemson
197

Ivar graduating from St. Paul’s boarding school in Boston, USA
198

Asia and Ivar at St. Paul’s School, Boston, USA
199

Asia and Ivar at St. Paul’s School, Boston, USA
200

Patrick with Declan (Dutchy) and Caspian
201

Family times – relaxing with Pier’s daughter Beatrix
Me with Alex’s son Henry
202

Sharing an ice cream dessert with Tristan
Mathilda, Henry and Beatrix on board my boat in Phuket
203

Kiki, Tristan and Caspian
204

Oe’s only daughter, Milky, her husband, Too, and baby Mountain
With Oe at Christmas 2020
205

With love: the last (and first) farewell. My dearest brother Maurice (RIP)
My dearest brother Maurice (RIP)
206

Maurice and his wife, Nicole (RIP)
207

APPENDIX A
From Elsevier magazine
Translated by Eric Smulders
SMULDERS GOES TO HONG KONG – September, 1998
First, he sold Cartier watches to the Chinese, later Friesian milk products and now
Dutch Master paintings. An interview with multimillionaire and art dealer Eric
Smulders van Heer Janspolder, a non-characteristic and very colourful Dutchman in
a city which never sleeps:
“The Chinese find it very interesting and maybe somewhat eccentric what I do.”
In the restaurant of the Hong Kong Club, the most renowned and exclusive
men-only club of the city, still emanating the great, colonial atmosphere from
earlier times, and in no way whatsoever seeming to fit with the Chinese People’s
Republic to which the former crown colony has belonged for a year now. Along
burgundy-red walls and over soft, grey carpets you can hear the controlled murmur
which has been a centuries’ old patent for the English upper class. Landscapes in
wooden frames, porcelain dinner plates, horse racing trophies behind glass. The
customers are obediently served by western waiters in white, navy-style uniforms,
a scene from the 1920s. Anyone who is important in Hong Kong is a member of
this club. Two hundred of the nine hundred members (of which only three are
Dutch) are Chinese, but they are not there every evening: it is Saturday, and no
Chinese in Hong Kong wants to waste his private time on (five star) western food.
Obviously, the Dutch businessman Eric Smulders is a member. Smulders (59) is a
member of all private venues in Hong Kong that are socially important. Everyone
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knows Smulders and Smulders knows everybody. A Hermès Birkin bag with a
beautiful woman behind it passes his table, “Eric, darling!” After a short conversation,
framed by hearty kisses, she continues her way. Smulders bows ‘bye-bye’; “No idea
who she is, in my work you meet so many people. Impossible to remember all.” He
himself is easy to recognise certainly when he moves around his blue Rolls-Royce
Corniche convertible from 1958 with his white Panama hat. He says, with childlike
pride, that it is the oldest Rolls convertible in the city with the densest Rolls degree
in the world. He uses it like a delivery van for his paintings which always fit thanks
to the opening roof.
“In Hong Kong no one is jealous,” says Eric. “I have had this car for twelve years, put
it anywhere, no one makes a scratch.” That is true also for the Jaguar and Daimler
of which he has one of each as well. You cannot call Eric Smulders poor. Twenty
years of living, working and building relationships in Hong Kong and China resulted
in a private capital of many million guilders (according to well-informed insiders, but
at least one zero too much, he says modestly) as well as a 300m2 penthouse on the
33rd and 34th floor on Peak Road – the Wassenaar of Hong Kong. Replace all the
houses of Wassenaar with skyscrapers, put them on a steep hill and you get an idea
of his living environment.
“It is very difficult to become a member here”, says Smulders, correcting his tie which
is needed to enter the club. “You have to be invited to become a member at a yearly
membership cost of 4,000 guilders per year, but there is a 10-year waiting list. There
are also other clubs with a long waiting list, but then you have to pay a fortune, here
you can be blackballed by one existing member.”
Fortunately, Smulders knew the Chairman of the Hong Kong Club (“He bought a
19th century landscape from me and I play golf with him at Shek O golf club”), that
made the waiting list a lot shorter.
Smulders leads a very un-Dutch, far from Calvinist, lifestyle, actually he is very
“un-Dutch”. Not everyone can or will tell that he will celebrate his 60th birthday
with some two hundred relations and friends, including his six brothers, for a
weekend-long party in black-tie on the Great Wall of China and Beijing, where
his 90-year-old mother will be carried to the wall in a classic Chinese carrying
chair. This event will be covered by the Hong Kong Tatler (magazine) and the South
China Morning Post under the auspices of his 40-year-old girlfriend, the French
socialite Elisabeth Cassegrain-Thomas, ex-representative of the Sultan of Brunei
and director of her own PR company which represents Garrard, Aspreys and
Longchamps (brands) and as such also knows anyone of any importance in this
Asian metropolis.
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No, Smulders is not married to her, he has already been married two times and
considers that enough for one lifetime – but he also has his problems. He had to
move from his penthouse on the Peak to the lower Peak as living in the clouds for
six months a year made him depressive. The high Peak is somehow more dignified
than the low Peak but at least he now looks upon other apartment buildings below
him and not to the clouds with a partial sea view. But this is really luxury whining.
Smulders laughs about it. “This is Hong Kong,” he says. “Everything has to be higher
and higher; everything changes all the time, if you cannot live with constant change
better go somewhere else to live.”
The economic slump in Southeast Asia, due to the sharp fall in the price of the real
estate, a barometer of Hong Kong’s prosperity, changed the value of his apartment
last year from about 20 million to 12 million guilders. Twenty years of speculative
demand due to the opening up of China, pulverized in less than six months’ time.
The values of real estate go up and down, but this also represents great opportunities
to make money.
“Selling fine art nowadays is very difficult. My clients are all experienced businessmen
and they always research a painting before they buy whether it is a Breughel, Renoir or
an Apple. Unless I buy from a private collection the market is now totally transparent
as all prices can be looked up on internet, so I always tell my customers my cost
price and add 25%, which if the painting is expensive is always still negotiable – no
more fat profits alas, but still enough to maintain a most pleasant lifestyle”. He is
an admirer of Loek Brons who he regularly meets at expositions and became one
of Holland’s best knowns art dealers. “Here you have a totally self-made man with
no art or any other higher education except a great sense of business with which
he created this textile empire (Zeeman Textile chain) and an innate love of art which
made him also successful in the art business in his later life.”
Smulders is an inventive person, and about 10 years ago when he found himself
not sufficiently occupied in his job, he discovered an opportunity to start the first
housing estate for foreigners in Beijing. At that time foreigners could not find proper
housing –housing was built for Chinese people and not for large American ladies
who did not fit in the tiny local bath where one amply fleshed leg would make the
bath water run over already. So, it was with a Chinese partner he built Greenland
Gardens consisting of more than 50 houses and a few hundred apartments with extralarge
baths, “American style”, which were soon rented out to the many expatriates
streaming into the fast-developing Beijing environment.
Due to the economic crisis hitting Hong Kong, many prime retail locations in
central Hong Kong were vacated and he convinced the managing director of Hong
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Kong Land, with whom he regularly plays golf in Shek O, to give him a large retail
space in the middle of the central business district for two years, rent free, provided
he decorated the nearly 1000m² which looked terrible empty (the ground floor of
Princess building). So, with his usual enthusiasm he organised an opening exhibition
of a collection of paintings called Nudes in the World of Art.
“Chinese are not different from us in appreciating the beauty of the female form,
and the exposition created a huge sensation with lots of publicity but very few sales
unfortunately because Chinese wives do not want pictures of naked ladies in the
living room. Anyway, the exposition put Master Paintings, as the gallery was called,
on the map and there were sufficient sales to keep my cash flow positive, so the new
gallery was off to a flying start”. With a wry smile he admits that he himself had to
remove a large painting of a very sensual Rubensian nude to a darker place in the hall
(of his apartment) as his partner also did not appreciate the display of this centuriesold,
sensuous flesh in the living room.
“I could never live in Holland anymore,” he muses, “although I love my country and
go there a few times a year. The weather is too cold, taxes are far too high and the
society tends to be jealous of success. There is a well-known story about this in Hong
Kong which goes as follows: a certain Mr Chan makes a lot of money and buys a
gold-coloured Rolls-Royce which he proudly drives around. He claims that if he had
a car like that in Europe lots of people would kick it or scratch it, but in Hong Kong
a passing father would tell his son: ‘You see that car, my boy, it belongs to Mr Chan
who was smart and worked hard and made a lot of money, so you better do the same
and then you can buy a similar car when you get older.’”
He obviously loves it here, and anyway, the majority of his close friends are Dutch.
“Dutchmen are everywhere, and you meet them all around the world doing some
kind of business. Recently when I was in Manchuria looking for antique Mongolian
carpets, I sat in the bar and heard a man talking with an obviously Dutch accent.
I started a conversation and sure enough he was as Dutch as can be, trying to set
up a rail-road container business from Ulan Bator through China to Rotterdam.
Wonderful, I hope he will make pots of money. The Dutch are gezellig (warm?), have a
great sense of humour, a healthy thirst for alcohol and don’t go home like the French
at nine o’clock”. He ends the evening with the remark I will not forget: “The Dutch
are the Chinese of Europe, we go everywhere, we are inventive, and we never give up,
something to be very proud of.”
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APPENDIX B
Article from newspaper
Dutchman proficient in Malay after five months
He nearly won top prize in speech contest.
Singapore, Saturday.
A Dutchman who arrived here five months ago without any knowledge of the Malay
is today fluent in the language.
Mr Eric Smulders, 27, a marketing re-seller assistant with the Shell Company here,
has gained so much ground in his study of the National Language since his arrival
last December that he was able to take part in a speech contest of the company.
According to a spokesman for the contest judges, Mr Smulders “lost narrowly to the
third-placed winner.” There were eight contestants. Mr Smulders, here on a two-year
contract, said he joined the company’s National Language class for the senior staff
in January. “That was my first contact with the Malay language,” he said. “Though
a Dutchman, I have not picked up the language from Indonesians at home or in
Indonesia. I attend an average of one-hour lesson a week.” How in that little study
time during the five short months of his stay here could he pick up the National
Language so fast? “Respect and sympathy for one’s country and national language
and a personal ambition to master that language.”
Much easier
Mr Smulders elaborated this point, saying: “If one shows respect and sympathy for a
person’s national language and understands the importance of a national language,
coupled with one’s ambition to master that language, then its all that much easier
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to master the language. Of course, a constant contact with the language must be
maintained. I, for instance, read and listen to the Malay language and converse with
my colleagues and friends in that language whenever I have the opportunity. One
common language certainly creates a feeling of togetherness among the people of a
nation. It binds the people of a country. In this case, the Malay language binds all
the Malaysians.” A linguist, Mr Smulders knows English, French, Dutch, and Italian
besides his mother-tongue.
Govt exam
“Malay,” he said, “is not very difficult to master. Grammatically, it is much easier
than any of the European languages that I know.” His ultimate ambition? “To master
the Malay language during my two-year stay here. I intend to sit for the Government
Standard I examination this August,” he said. Mr Smulders, a Master of Science
Economics degree holder from the Netherlands School of Economics in Rotterdam,
has worked in Belgium and the United States previously.
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APPENDIX C
Speech made by Ton Niewenhyzen Segaer on Eric’s 80th birthday.
Now nearly 62 years ago a group of about 70 young men stood in front of the
Rotterdam Student Corps building Hermes. We didn’t know each other, our hair
was completely shaved off as is the norm for first year aspiring corps members and
most of us hadn’t any idea what would happen to us: we just came from school and
some from military service and we were starting at a new phase in our lives. As the
doors were closed we only could enter through some five meter high windows and
alot of infighting and loud screaming and shouting, we were arranged in alphabetical
order. Because my name starts with an N, I came between Wim Meier Warner Philips
with behind me Eric Smulders, Herman Vos and Herman Vriens. Luck or not we
quickly became friends sharing all the misery together and formed our club, “The
Raad van Elf” which is the only one from 1965 which still regularly meets together,
wheelchair or not.
Eric also just had left school and even at this early stage he made a clearly odd or
remarkable impression. Not only because of his already over used voice bands and
dark voice but also because of his scarred head (and other parts?) due to his refusal
to accept any challenge, whatever the size of his opponent he always fought back. In
his third year he was absent from the year club for nearly three months because of a
motorcycle accident somewhere in Switzerland which added some interesting scars
such as a cow bone in his nose and a bunch of fake teeth to his already marked face.
Quite an unruly guy, he actually accepted no shit from anybody.
I also remember that Eric had a monkey in his student room which made us avoid
the place because of the smell and the aggressiveness of the little beast who would
attack anybody except any of his many female visitors which he smuggled into his
room as in those days co-habitation, even for an hour, was not allowed.
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Eric also had a car quite special for those days, a sort of motorised double bicycle
(made in Azerbaijan or some other faraway place) which on a drunker night, was
carried into the Corps building to drive around on the bar and other makeshift race
tracks made from long tables.
Also with his husky voice he could impress us with a poetically pornographic version
of Mack the Knife which became our club song. He was certainly not afraid of anyone
and even at this young age he was totally intolerant to authority. One night he got
into a fight with a night watch and lo and behold, he managed to chase him away,
probably too drunk to realise that the guy was twice his size.
Also I have to mention that he managed to finish his studies with an economics
Master degree (in a record time of less then five years) far ahead of all the others
because being a (brilliant?) opportunist, he chose the easiest courses available. For
his scription (normally a six to 12 months research project) he found an old book
in the library dated 1921 which had only once been taken out in more than 50
years, creatively re-writing the “History of Swiss trading Companies” as the book was
called. He completed his Scription in an absolute record time and paid the library
fine gladly for the never returned book. Incredibly his cleverly reworded Opus was
awarded an A to the great envy of all of us. He only told me this story very much
later, on a very drunken night. Because he finished his studies so early we missed
the alcohol drenched sumptuous ship launchings on his family’s shipyards where we
would overload on champagne and even brought some bags filled with bottles to be
used sometime later… We always left as the last ones properly inebriated...
And then we lost contact for a number of years, everybody busy with wives, ex-wives
children, careers, etc.
Eric started his career with Shell in Malaysia and he told me later that after having
been lodged in a beautiful Shell house, he had the help of three staff to do all his
housework. The first morning they made him kneel down on the floor to give a last
brush to his shoes saying, “Tuan I must never leave his house with dirty shoes.” As he
later told me that moment, “I made probably the most intelligent decision of my life,”
never to return to Europe any more for work… and so he did... all the stories must be
true because I got them straight from the horse’s mouth…
It is remarkable that time falls away whenever we meet each other due to the deep
connection formed during a student time. Three members have unfortunately left us
already, Thomas, Henk and Herman, and one or two have decided not to have any
contact anymore for whatever reason.
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Eric you have added a Heerlijckheid (titled land property) to your name unclear
whether inherited or bought. Whatever, the “Heer Janspolder” some 200 hectares
you acquired (vanity is the name?) is an actual for more than 50 years under water
polder where tons of mussels could be harvested every year were it not that the soil
has been poisoned forever by a refinery nearby on the island of Goeree Overflakkee.
And now dear Eric and Oe we are your guests at your 80th birthday party in the
wonderful hotel Huis ter Duin in Noordwijk, a weekend-long, 200 pax feast of family
and friends, all expenses paid but, as a typical economist, no extra room charges or,
unsigned by you, bar charges...
In our family we always celebrated what was possible to celebrate in big parties with
speeches and cabaret... I have met many old friends I haven’t seen for years so thank
you for your wonderful generosity, a great band and amazing speeches.
A big thank you on behalf of your whole student club also and we all hope to be
there on your 90th party as well. Again, thank you very much and may we have a
magnificent time and unforgettable weekend. Your buddy, Ton Niewenhyzen Segaer.
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