I have experience in boutique business as I have been doing it during the holidays. In the coming years and beyond, I will be expanding my botique business and also I will employ some workers to take care of it as I continue to develop my career in education.

In my opinion, what GiveDirectly does well in this program is that we receive the transfers in lumpsum amounts. This helps in planning as one is in a position to do something huge as compared to when the transfers are given in small instalments. Another thing that GiveDirectly does well is that the unlearned recipients are taught how to use mpesa. This has reduced the number of theft cases in the community as most of us managed to change our pins to a more secure code. What needs to be done differently is enrolling all the individuals in the household to avoid household conflict. During enrollment, those individuals who did not have responsibilities by then were left out of the program yet these are the same people who steal from their old and vulnerable parents. Another thing that needs to be done differently is enrolling all the communities in a specific village for uniformity purposes and this will prevent too many complaints coming from the communities that are left out during the registration to the programs.

I am a student in my third year pursuing bachelors in education. I used part of the transfers of kshs 20,000 to pay for my tuition fees. Before the transfers, I used to sell out some of my livestock like chicken and goats to pay school fees, it was never enough and mostly my relatives could chip in. I also bought two cows for kshs 30,000 for the purposes of paying dowry. Once I will be done with my studies I will be marrying and by then my cows would have multiplied in number since both of them are female.

It was around 9:00 PM when I realized that I had received a message from GiveDirectly bearing the good news of the receipt of my first transfer. At that moment I had just got home from the nearby shopping center where I had taken a walk to. It was so exciting receiving this information with my family at home that we had to celebrate and had a long talk before taking our dinner late that night. In my mind, it was a relief in that I had a plan to clear all the school fees arrears and the current fees that I was yet to pay for my two children in secondary school.

The biggest difference in my daily life is the huge investment on the livestock after obtaining a heifer and a bullock that will boost my future plans on marriage. Receiving the transfer cleared the fear I that had been slowing me down in the focus to start my family but I am glad that I can confidently plan ahead now.

On receiving my first transfer, I had a lot lined up in my mind that I wished to do but with the hiked prices of all that I needed in the nearby markets, I had to zero down to the few that were deemed more important to me. At my current age, I had been working hard to build on the savings that will help me right from the point of marriage where I need to pay the dowry to the future life with my kids. With this idea in mind, I spent the first KES 35000 on obtaining a heifer and a bullock. I hoping to grow the two and even Haddington more when I receive the second transfer as they will be of great boost in dowry payment. I also spent KES 5000 on my clothing, KES 6000 on adding foodstuff to my food baskets, and saved the remaining KES 8000 as I wait to top it up with a portion of the second transfer that will enhance the start of small clothing business.