To be admitted to Government buildings you need ID. Most New Yorkers carry their drivers licence and use that. I don’t have a US driving licence, I only have my passport. I am loath to carry my passport with me everywhere because it’s expensive and a complete pain to replace if it gets lost. I forget to take it on this occasion. I show the security guard my credit card and other cards in my wallet and tell him I have an appointment. I play the British card and see  if that works too. Then, as if from nowhere an older lady interjects. ‘You gotta have ID, what happens if you die? Who’s gonna know who you are?’. I try to ignore her and focus on the security guard but to no avail. ‘If you die and and you don’t have no ID, you’re gonna end up in the morgue and in City Cemetary and no one will know where you are. You gotta have ID.’ She is not helping my cause and I am still not getting in the building. She carries on, ‘I carry my ID even when I go to the store, you never know when you’re gonna get run over and die’. Eventually she shuffles off, ID fully on show on a chain around her neck and I am now faced with the supervisor, who is also deeply concerned I have no ID. I am saved by someone from the office who collects me and I breathe a sigh of relief. Gotta get some ID. Can’t face that again.