Earlier this year, my grandfather passed away and I was required to contribute KES 1000 towards his funeral, which I did. To date, I have used KES 2700 to pay for my children's school fees even though there is still an outstanding deficit of KES 700. Of the remaining money, I channeled KES 700 towards acquiring food and saved the rest to secure a goat later.

After being abandoned by my husband, my daughter and I moved in with my mother, who is an alcohol brewer. Since I am unemployed, I depend on her financially. When I got my first transfer of ksh3000, I spent it equally on my child's school and food. My second transfer came in when I had a burial so I used it all on the burial expenses. Then when I got my third transfer, my child was unwell and the hospital bill was ksh5700. I used it all on it and to help clear the bill, I took a loan of ksh2700 which I plan on settling using the funds I will be receiving from give directly.

In my opinion, GiveDirectly does well in terms of helping the needy in society. I am happy that I can be able to smile again and have hope in life. The transfer has helped us purchase food for our families, pay school fees for our children. Were it not for the transfer this would not have happened. Some of our children would have opted to drop out of school.

A few days before receiving the transfer I was so unfortunate to lose a relative of mine. We immediately started the burial plans. In the plans, we were required to contribute some amount to facilitate the burial of my relative. Since I did not have any money at that time I waited eagerly to receive the transfer so that I could facilitate that on my end. When I received the transfer I gave out KSH 1000 as part of my contribution towards the burial plans of my relative. I also spent KSH 1000 in paying school fees for my 3 children. I gave 2 KSH 300 each while the other I gave KSH 400. I did this so that I could avoid a situation where they were going to be sent home and lose valuable time in terms of their studies. I also used the remaining KSH 1000 in buying food for the family. The current situation makes it hard to even be able to purchase food. Since I had little food left to cook in the house, I opted to add more stock to the already existing one.

I was sitting outside my house thinking hard about how I was going to provide for my sleeping children who did not eat anything last evening. At that moment my phone rang and when I looked into it was a text message confirming that I had received cash from GiveDirectly. I cannot explain how hard I smiled but I can remember that I jumped up in ecstasy. I quickly closed the door went to the shop and bought food for my kids.

There is a lot of big difference. I being a single mother have gone through everything hard life can give to a human being. With this cash, I have used it to pay school fees for my kids and even buy food for my family and by doing so I am relieved emotionally and I am now happy that I will have peace of mind. 

I am a single mother and I have three kids with me who depend on me for their survival. I also don’t have a stable job and have been surviving on casual jobs. With casual jobs, it is even hard to get one these days. Life has become tough for me. When I received the cash from Give Directly I was very grateful. I spent KSH 2000 on paying school fees balances for my kids. They had been at home for the past two weeks before receiving the money. That was my priority then since I want them to acquire education so that they can have a good life in the future. In addition to paying school fees, I spent KSH 1000 on food since I did not have any food at all and my food stock had run out completely.