Through GiveDirectly I have managed to gain some form of financial stability which I really needed because I stay alone and as I had mentioned earlier I lost my spouse years ago and since we were not lucky enough to bare children I no help whatsoever and yet I ma quite old. Also I would rely on farming but we barely experience rain anyways. Therefore I ma so grateful for getting enrolled in this program because I genuinely needed the assistance.

Due to the fact that I had received a phone from GiveDirectly, after I got the first transfer I received KES 1,200 from the program and I decide to cater for the meal situation of my family because we had almost run out of food. I went ahead and used the KES 1,200 and bought maize flour and sugar. Now when it comes to my second transfer where I received KES 3,000 which was during the holiday and considering all the festivities and activities that would be taking palace I decided to buy eight packets of maize flour where each was KES 120 so it totalled to KES 960, two packets of wheat flour for KES 300, two litres of cooking oil at KES 400 and a kilogram of meat at KES 400. As of that moment I had used KES 2,060 and was left with a balance of KES 940 which I used for my day to day activities and the beginning of the year I fell ill and used some of that money to pay my hospital bills.

I was just home that day when I heard the message come in and I called one of the children in our homestead to help me read it that is when I found out I received the money. I was so happy honestly because that day I was sure I was going to bed hungry because I had no money at all so to me it felt almost like it was heaven sent.

There has not big that much changes since this was only my first transfer but with what I received I managed to get something to eat because I depend on subsistence farming to have a meal in my house. But the drought this year was severe and I did not manage to harvest anything. Plus I rely on myself to provide since I did not get lucky to have a child when my husband was still alive and so I have no else to rely on apart from myself.

I barely had enough food to even make a meal that day but fortunately I received the money so I went ahead and bought a couple of things so that I could manage to put a meal on the table that evening so I took five packets of maize flour for KES 500, a kilogram of sugar for KES 120, tea leaves for KES 100 and laundry detergent for KES 150. Then unfortunately I fell ill at the time since I had a running stomach and I had to pay around KES 200 for the medication.