Present at Sihanouk's Fire

Sometimes a journalist can get a little too close to the story. As a correspondent who covered Indochina events off and on from the Vietnam War onwards, I sent a letter to King Norodom Sihanouk's widow, Queen Monineath, and delivered it to the palace in early January, three months after the king's passing in Beijing at age 89 on Oct 15, 2012.

"I covered…