I am growing older and older thus engaging in daily chores and causal jobs is becoming challenging. I had built a small house while I was still stronger. By then it was pretty and spacious enough for us but as time went by it turned smaller and older. This made it uncomfortable for us and the leaking roof made it worse to stay in. I had a plan to build a more decent house before, a dream that I never saw it coming through since my daily household needs grew higher forcing me to spend much of my wages on. I totally lost hope of building another one as I got older and accepted to stay in my pitiable conditions. When I received my transfer I felt it had dawned on my life. I no longer worry about a leaking roof. Currently, I live under a decent spacious iron-roofed house courtesy of GiveDirectly. Being able to fulfill this at my age is the biggest difference in my daily life.

In my opinion, GiveDirectly has done well in uplifting our lives which were miserable before enrollment. We have been able to provide for our families effectively, purchasing livestock as assets and most importantly, building better iron-roofed houses thus enjoying good shelter. I do not see anything that GiveDirectly does not do well.

I had earlier built a house using my first transfer thus I got a chance to invest the second transfer and I made a decision to buy a cow worth KES30000. I made this decision so that I will be getting milk from for both household consumption and sales and offsprings. I took another KES14000 to spent on our clothing. It had been long since we had better smart clothes thus I made the decision to buy some to replace the tone ones. In addition, I spent the remaining amount on my household's daily basic needs.

The biggest difference in my daily life since is that I have been able to achieve my long desired dreams of building a spacious house for my family and owning a heifer. The realization that I now own a heifer gladdens my heart since through it, I will be able to achieve so many things. Apart from getting milk for my family's consumption, my daily expenditure will have reduced and I will also be earning an income even when GiveDirectly shall have stopped giving us the promised financial aid.

It was around 2 o'clock in the morning when I received a message notification on my phone. Since I was awake at that time, I decided to check in order to know who the sender was since it was not a norm for me to receive a message at that hour. At that instant, my heart was filled with happiness due to the realization that I had received the promised money from GiveDirectly. This message confirmed to me that indeed GiveDirectly was serious when they promised to give us financial aid.

Building a spacious house for my family had always been my dream but I was not able to achieve this due to lack of money. When I received my first transfer, I spent part of it to buy some building materials such as timbers, nails, iron sheets and I also paid workers for this work of building my new beautiful spacious house. I settled on this because the house we were living in was a one-room grass-thatched house and could not accommodate all family members. Buying milk has been my routine and it is always costly. Due to this, I used the remaining amount to buy a heifer, a goat and four chicken. When the heifer reproduces, my family will be getting milk for their consumption and I will also be selling the surplus in order to earn an income. I will also be selling some of my eggs at times so as to get money to use in buying basic needs like soap and cooking fat for my family.