Dutch often has weird exceptions to rules or rules that seem very arbitrary. One reason for some of the spelling oddities in Dutch is political: and can totally be blamed on the French.
Shortly after WWII, the Dutch got together and created a spelling committee to reorganize the language and to make it less old fashioned. The committee included the Dutch and the Flemands--Dutch speaking (almost) folks from Belgium.
The Dutch folks wanted to erase all German reflections from the language because they didn't care for the Germans (for obvious reasons): they wanted to replace all of the "k"s with "c"s changing the appearance of the words but not their sounds.
The Flemands wanted to erase all French reflections from the language because they didn't care for the French (for obvious reasons): they wanted to replace all of the "c"s with "k"s also changing the appearance of the words but not their sounds.
Since the committee needed to agree on something, they just ended up compromising. They changed some words one way and changed other words the other way.
So if you ever can't figure out why you cannot, for the life of you, figure out the correct spelling of a Dutch word, just blame the French. And the Germans. And probably committees.
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