My life has changed in that after the Givedirectly registration on my name as the recipient, it gave me a decision power in my family because initially, my husband was very disrespectful to my opinion because I had nothing to contribute to the family. I had also lived with him for twelve years without paying my dowry and we used the transfer to settle the dowry that makes me fulfilled as a woman and respected by fellow women in my community. I managed to buy utensils because before I would always borrow utensils whenever I had guests with the fear of not having any cash to buy for a refund in case my children broke a neighbors plate by mistake. The kind of harmony and peace that we enjoy in the family after we received the transfer has re-energized our marriage and we are able to engage in our daily hustles as a family and continued to budget together even on our other earnings besides the transfer.

In my opinion they did well in that they gave us cash that allowed us to meet our own needs. GD did not do anything wrong.

I used the second transfer to buy iron sheets to build a new house because my two-roomed house was very small to accommodate me with my children, I also purchased maize and beans for food for my family because we had a poor yield due to heavy rains that destroyed our crops and I feared my family will go without food. I also paid fees to my daughter and saved part of the money in case of emergency because most of the times I would end up borrowing from friends and now I will just be getting it from my m-pesa savings.

The biggest difference in my daily life is that we have fulfilled our traditions as required of us.We are now free to build a new home in our compound. I also respected like my age-mates in the village.

I had loaned someone 50 KES,so I thought he had refunded me that money,I did not see the many zeros besides the 5,I gave him to confirm for me the amount,that is when he told me it was 55000 KES from GiveDirectly. I was so happy,I even snatched the phone away from him thinking he might transfer the money to his phone without my knowledge.

I spent my first transfer on buying cows that were used to pay my dowry. I had stayed with my husband for close to nine years but he has never paid my dowry as traditions require of him for lack of ability to do so. I have also bought some iron sheets that I will use to build a new house in my compound.