"My life desire has been to own a spacious house for my family and a cafe business, but due to financial instability, I am forced to live in a very disasterous house that is not worthy for living. Being a single parent who is employed as a labourer in a small cafe that earns me only one hundred shillings per day, my income can not support my family's basic needs. Receiving this money means enabling me to meet my life goals. I will construct a good house for myselfy with my first transfer. I also plan to use my second transfer to start a cafe business. This will be my reliable source of income and hence this will changing my life for the better."

"I am a house wife with no reliable source of income to supplement the little amount earned by my husband from his buskets weaving business. This situation has forced us to skip some meals and also my children are mostly sent home due to lack of school fee. Therefore, lack of reliable source of income is the biggest hardship that I have ever faced."

"The biggest hardship I have faced in my life is paying school fees for my children.I depend on farming to pay school fees for my children.Farming in this region is not reliable because of the climatic conditions and crop diseases especially for maize farming.Currently I have two children in college and one who is waiting to join college.I cannot manage three children in college and thats why one has to wait for the other to complete.I have three children in primary school and one of them will be joining secondary school next year.This is clear that the burden is increasing more and more as children move to higher academic level."

"The biggest hardship I have faced in my life is the financial constraints that one goes through as the children grow up.A few years ago we took a loan from a sacco which really strained us.We took the loan to start a cereals business which did not pick well.At one time they threatened to sell our property because of deafaulting.Generally,meeting the family's needs has not been easy.My husband is in the business most of the time as a middle man while I am at home doing a little bit of farming."

"Receiving this money will help me cement this floor.With that I will avoid dust and the work that involves maintainance.I will also buy a dairy cow which will increase milk production hence giving me surplus to sell.I will also buy clothes with the remaining part of the transfers."

"My feeling is that, lack of reliable source of income is my biggest hardship. This is because, I have been hustling a lot as an early childhood development teacher in order to support my husband who was doing general medicine course. Since his completion, he has never been employed, something that has forced him to do contracts work to supplement my little income. Our combined earnings are never enough to sustain our family needs and this makes me feel that, unreliable source of income as the biggest hardship I have ever faced."

"In this community, livestock play a very big role in the lives of most families. They are a form of savings that we depend on to make income so as to fend for other household needs like food and the children's education. When my only dairy cow died about a year ago due to a severe drought, I was so worried that I would not get income to buy food for my family and thus subject them to malnutrition because of lack of other sources of income. This situation has taken a toll on my children physically and academically. This is the biggest hardship I've faced in my life. Thanks to GiveDirectly, I will be happy to own a cow again since I am planning to spend my first transfer on one. "

"I have been asthmatic for more than fifty years now, a condition I've had since childhood. The sickness has recently deteriorated to the extent that I am now bedridden and cannot get out of bed on my own. I could not seek preventive medication before because of the state of poverty I am in. I do not have properties to sell even at the moment so as to seek proper medical check up and treatment. I am hopeless and everything is now up to chance. This is the biggest hardship I've faced in my life. My earnest prayer is trusting God for a restoration of health."

"My wife and I live in a tiny hut with our nine children. I have always desired to build a bigger house especially for my grown up children so as to accord them the dignity they deserve. I am a tea plucker. This is a casual job I have endured for about 20 years so as to fend for my large family. The dues I have always earned can only cater for their food and a few items for school leaving me with nothing to save. Receiving this money is a turn around in my life. I am planning to build a bigger house for the eleven of us and purchase a dairy cow with the remaining amount. This will ease the burden of having had to buy milk to sustain my family for the last two decades. I have never been this excited, I know this windfall will change my life for the better."

"In the next six months, I expect my life to change in that most of my goals will have been accomplished. I am planning to increase household items such as seats. I had very few seats and I felt adding more would be of help. I will have also built an animal shed for my goats. Since they are expanding very fast I need to start thinking ahead being that currently, they are sleeping in one of the isolated rooms which is not up to standards and not safe either."