My new goal is to construct a separate house for my children. Currently, we sleeping in the same room with 6 children with some of them being big boys. This is against the tradition of a community. I had wished to build a separate shelter for them but I lack the financial muscles.

In my opinion, GiveDirectly did well in sending cash transfers directly to our phones. With the main challenges that we had, the unconditional nature of the transfer allows us to solve our issues at the individual household level. All I can say is everything went well and I do not see anything that it did not do well.

For a year, we have been living in a small and poor condition house which had collapsed on one side. This forced us to seek an alternative and opt to take a loan in order to construct a new house. After receiving my transfer, I spent KES 24,000 to clear the loan that I had, the lender was threatening to demolish our house once we fail to raise the money in full. GiveDirectly transfer has saved me from that humiliation that was about to befall our family. In addition, I used KES 18,000 to clear the school fees for my 3 children who are in secondary school and one in grade 1. I also used KES 1000 to secure my Identity card which was seized for a year at the nearby private hospital where I had taken my kid for treatment but I lack money to clear the bills. Lastly, I bought proper beddings for KES 7,800 for my kids who were spending their night on the floor.

I was sweating profusely arranging logs of trees in preparations of making charcoals at around 9am when my phone rang. Usually if I am busy I don’t leave my work to attend to phones but this time round I felt some inward push and I had no alternative than confirming what kind of message I had received. I raised my hands as a sign of thanking God for making GiveDirectly to send me the transfer. I was very happy. I hurriedly finalized with the charcoal making preparations. I called and booked my helper for the day after so that we can go and withdraw the money.

Initially, I was an unhappy parent. My children were making me to feel guilty for being unable to cater for their education. I also felt very low seeing them at home because of school fees while other students were in school. Through GiveDirectly, my children are happy in school making me feel at peace. Again I was able to start a good business which I am sure it will boost our living condition. Initially I only relied on making and selling chapatti from one household to the other for me to feed my children. May I appreciate the entire GiveDirectly organization.

After the registration I had so much faith that I was going to receive the money since I had witnessed people from neighboring villages receiving. I sat down and planned for the money in advance. My 3 secondary children were on and off school due to school fees something that didn’t give me peace of mind. They were even sometime blaming me for taking them to school knowing that I had no capacity of taking care of their education. On receiving the money I took KES 21,000.00 and cleared their current fee balances. I also have other 3 children who are in primary school, so I took KES 3000.00 and paid school fees for them too. Having settled that, I opted to start a new business of selling clothes so that I secure a source of income no matter how little it will be but it better half a bread than no bread at all.