Drought and famine has impacted us very negatively back here in the village especially since most of us are farmers and depended on farming to feed our families, and due to the lack of rain our living conditions have deteriorated. That is why when I received the transfers I went ahead to cater for nourishment for my family and I, and so I went ahead and bought a bag of maize which contained a dozen packets for KES 1,300. I was left with KES 1,700 where I used KES 400 to buy water since that was also very scarce and I would walk for almost an hour on a normal day to fetch and carry drinking water on my head so that my family and I could use. From the balance left I took KES 300 and bought two kilograms of sugar then used the remaining KES 1,000 to buy clothes for me and my child since the ones we had were old and worn out.

I spent my very most transfers to buy a sunkig solar. I have been using kerosene which is expensive an unfriendly for my children during their study. This cost me a down payment of 1,600/=, and a daily payment of KES 60 for the next 10 months. As a result, there is nowadays sufficient lighting system in my house thus my children find it easy to do their study at night.

GiveDirectly does well in terms of the technique they use in enrolling people in the program. They deal with people directly and there are no intermediaries in between. This has ensured that needy people are enrolled in the program. That has excited me and we are sure we are going to receive the transfer as planned.

I currently have four children. They all depend on me. I don’t have a permanent job and depend on manual jobs for my survival. The payment I get from the jobs is too little to fulfill all the needs I have for myself and my family. The poor state of the economy has made it very difficult for me to secure a job. I can spend as long as a week without getting any job. This then makes life difficult for my family and me. The money I get is used fully on food and also paying school fees for my children. When I received the transfer I used it all in paying school fees for my children who had been sent home from school. They had stayed at home for the last one week before receiving the transfer. I am now happy that they are back in school continuing with their education.

I received the amount at around 9 am. I was not expecting to receive any cash on this fateful day. I was relaxing at my homestead. My phone rang and when I checked the phone I confirmed that I had received the money. I was happy and the rest of my day was a jovial day. I spent the whole day smiling.

There is a big difference in my life in that my kids can now continue with their education. I have plenty of food in my house for my family. My husband was struggling to find school fees for our kids and with the money, we were able to pay the school fees so that is helpful to us and we are very grateful for that.

Life in my area has become hard. Our farms are no longer productive the climatic conditions are very harsh. Growing food on the farm is a waste of time and resources at the moment. We mostly depend on manual jobs such as burning charcoal and building house for other people and also selling water since it is a scarce commodity at the moment. With the manual jobs, it is hard to survive on them. When I got the cash I spent KSH 210 on purchasing water for my use at the home. I also spent KSH 1200 to pay school fees for my kids who were on the verge of being sent home from school due to fee balances. I also spent KSH 1200 on buying food for the family to avoid scenarios where we have no food at all in the house.