The weekly Pink Palace Greek cultural show takes place in the Pink Palace Palladium nightclub, a cavernous indoor space that features mirrored columns, semi-disposable plastic tables and a 100-foot bar. Some 200 Pink Palace guests mill around the bar in the moments before the Greek dancing starts, and there is a hint of excitement in the air. Most everyone (including Valentina and I) clutches a beer, and the pink ouzo is flowing faster than ever. Tables full of sunburned boys swill beers and peer over at tables full of sunburned girls. Solo travelers line the bar like sock-hop wallflowers. Sitting with Valentina at the end of the bar, I entertain myself by eavesdropping on my neighbors.

"How about that guy?" says the girl on my right.

"What guy?" her friend replies.

"That guy. The Greek-looking guy." She nods over at a muscular, dark-eyed local fellow who's been skulking and pouting his way past the wallflowers since dinner ended.

"Oh Jesus. That guy is a scumbag, honey -- with a capital S."

"Yeah, but I'm on vacation!"

As the two girls giggle over this, a deeply suntanned blond guy in a floral-print shirt walks up to me with an exaggerated air of nonchalance. "You gonna hit dat tonight, dog?" he says, barely making eye contact.

"Am I gonna what?" I say.

The blond guy makes a casual nod at Valentina. "I'm just askin' if you gonna hit dat, 'cause if you ain't, then I'm all over it."

For a moment, I'm not sure if I should flash a gang sign or laugh out loud. Instead, I decide to clarify. "Yes," I say, trying to strike a balance between cordiality and sarcasm. "I'm gonna hit dat."

Mr. Hit-Dat gives me a knowing grin. "It's cool, yo," he says before sifting off into the crowd.

Before long, the cultural show begins: 200 Pink Palace revelers are suddenly caught up in a swirl of dancing and clapping, of mildly humiliating audience participation and gleefully-smashed performance crockery. Plate shards fly, ouzo bottles empty and -- every so often -- sunburned strangers lock lips.

Standing at the fringes with Valentina, I can't help but marvel at the marketing genius behind this booze-soaked corner of Corfu. Some people travel the world for spiritual reasons; others travel to shop exotic markets or take interesting photos. But a great many people, most of them young, want nothing more than to drink and flirt and make noise on a warm beach far away from home. The Pink Palace caters to this need with brilliant efficiency.

For a moment, I imagine an international Pink Palace Party-Travel Empire: a pink-hued fleet of planes and buses and boats and camel caravans connecting youth resorts styled on the party theme of any given culture. Pink rattan huts on the Andaman Sea featuring rice whiskey, Thai dance and kick boxing; pink desert pueblos in Baja featuring tequila, hat dances and bullfighting; pink onion-dome towers in St. Petersburg featuring vodka, Cossack dancing and ice hockey.

Valentina nudges me out of my reverie before the Greek dancing reaches its climax. "Let's go down to the beach," she says to me.

We make our way downhill to the sand, past the now-quiet poolside buildings. By the time we make it to the beach, we can barely hear the shouts of partyers from the Palladium nightclub. We walk to a smooth stretch of sand and huddle together against the breeze.

The black Adriatic bubbles and foams in the darkness beyond our feet; above, the hazy belt-strap of the Milky Way arches its way across the sky, nearly touching the horizon. A stray dog pads past, stopping momentarily to growl at the surf. Devoid of partyers, the beach is empty, peaceful. Valentina and I have the entire Pink Palace beachfront to ourselves. We move a little closer together and stare up at the sky.

After 20 or so minutes, Valentina breaks the silence. "You were wrong," she says.

"About what?"

"About the Pink Palace."

"How was I wrong about the Pink Palace?"

Valentina looks over at me with just the hint of a smile. "You said it wasn't romantic."

I grin back at Valentina, and we move still closer together in the sand -- the pre-marketed, pink-tinged roar of Greek bacchanalia just barely audible from up the hill.

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