On a bright, pleasant Sunday, I stepped out of my house to waltz through a bar crawl with my friend. It began at Permit & Co — an almost ironic starting point for a crawl rooted in the city’s old-school permit room culture. By 2.45 pm, strangers were already warming up over a welcome drink, exchanging introductions that felt less like networking and more like the beginning of a long, shared evening.

From there, the trail moved southwards to Gokul, then Sunlight, followed by Café New York, before looping back to Permit & Co for a high-energy bar takeover. Each stop came with its own rhythm, plates of munchies, and the kind of conversations that only get easier as the afternoon slips into evening (a drink each hour).