SINGAPORE -- Southeast Asia's marathon trek toward economic development has seen those who refuse to conform to the cutthroat rhythms of globalization slipping through the cracks of modernity.
Among them, the sea-dwelling peoples who have inhabited the coastlines, islets and seas of insular Southeast Asia -- an archipelago stretching for about 4,000 km from southern Thailand to the island of New Guinea -- for millennia are arguably the most romantic and defiant.
