My life is currently different in that I now have a cow of my own. Buying milk to feed my family is now a thing of the past and this is going to allow me save up enough money that would enable me make other family investments that will change my living standards and that of my entire family. I never thought I would have one of my own cows anytime soon since the little income that I received from my casual jobs could not allow me to save and buy one. My children have also been eating well lately and we had the best christmas celebration recently. All these were made possible courtesy of GiveDirectly transfers. Moreover, I have been able to build a brand new house that has increased the comfort of staying in our home and I feel these are things I would not have done had I not received GiveDirectly transfers.

GiveDirectly did so well in giving every deserving household money and giving them the freedom to choose how they were going to spend this money. This brought total change to the different families in my village and everyone is so much grateful for the timely support. On the other hand, I personally did not find anything that I thought should be corrected by GiveDirectly officers in how they conducted their operations.

I used all of my second transfer to build a new, bigger and better house. I saw the need to build a new house since the one that we were staying in with my family was so small and the family size was increasing. My children too were growing older and needed more space and privacy. This could not be guaranteed with the small room that we were all sharing. I therefore made the decision to build a new house to provide them with this space. I feel so proud of this achievement so far.

The biggest difference in my daily life is that my family now lives happily. This is because they now get some milk for their consumption courtesy of GiveDirectly unlike before. I would only afford to buy milk for use in making tea alone previously and my children would at times wish to drink milk but it was never possible. I am now glad since I believe that their health will improve since apart from taking milk, I will be able to provide them with a balanced diet.

It was around 3 a.m. when I received a message notification on my phone. Since I was awake at that time, I decided to check who the sender was. My heart was filled with happiness upon realizing that GiveDirectly had deposited the promised money into my account. I knew that my dream of owning a dairy cow would soon be realized.

When I received my first transfer, I spent part of it to buy a dairy cow. When it reproduces, my family will not be buying milk from our neighbors anymore. As a way of starting a poultry keeping project, I spent some amount to buy some chicken, wire mesh and nails to use in building a chicken coop. My wife will be running this project alongside other projects. I used the remaining amount to buy food and home clothes for my family and I also bought school uniforms for my children.