The new goal that I have in life is to start a business of buying and selling livestock majorly goats and sheep. I have two children who will be joining secondary school next year and I foresee financial constraints since being the breadwinner of my family, catering to our needs on time has been a challenge to me despite them being in primary school where the fee that they pay in a year is less than KES 5000. Starting this business will enable me to pay their school fees and at the same time be able to meet our basic needs on time.

GiveDirectly did well by choosing to uplift the poor people in society through their cash program. Because of this, most people have been able to provide better shelter for their families, pay school fees for their children and also feed and dress well unlike before. I do not see anything that GiveDirectly does not do well.

When I received my transfer, I spent KES 35000 to build a house for my sons. I decided on this since they had been sleeping in a smaller one that was in a bad condition as it was old. In addition, I spent KES 13000 on a calf as a way of investing this money and used the remaining amount on food for the family. I depend on subsistence farming and I sometimes get help from my son who works in Nairobi. When it calves, I will be using money from the sale of surplus to pay school fees for my two children who will be joining secondary school next year. By doing so, my son will be able to save part of his income and use it to develop himself. I am grateful to GiveDirectly for enabling me to take a step in transforming my life and that of my family.

It was around 8 pm and I was at home with my family. We were about to retire to our beds when I heard my phone ringing hence notifying me of a new message. I decided to check it and to my surprise, I found out that it was an SMS from my mobile money provider. I wondered who could have thought of sending me some money at this time, and on checking the contents of the SMS well, I found out that it was the promised transfer that we had been eagerly waiting for from GiveDirectly. I was filled with so much joy on seeing this that I immediately told my family about it. They were so happy on hearing the wonderful news and we celebrated together. We now knew that the plans that we had already made were now going to be truly achieved.

The transfer has brought a very big difference in my life and that of my family. We have been able to accomplish the dreams that we have been having for a long time. We were able to construct new houses and buy a calf. We were also able to buy a few bags of maize with the remaining amount. We thus have enough to eat. Thank you so much GiveDirectly for the help.

We spent the better part of the transfer money on building other houses. We built two houses, that is, a kitchen and the main house. We decided to do so because this is what we had always desired to do but due to lack of money, we were not in a position to. The houses that we used to live in were old, small, and they were grass-thatched. We thus wanted modern and bigger houses that could accommodate the four of us. I usually do the business of buying and selling cows to provide for my family. The money that I make from the business most of it usually goes to the payment of school fees for my two children who are in primary school and farming. We are about to complete the construction and when this happens, we will be able to have a bigger space that will be enough for us all. Apart from building the houses, we also bought a calf at KES 15000, and the remaining amount, we used it in buying food.