My life is different than how it would have been had I not received the transfer. This is because I am now financially independent. Due to this, I no longer depend on my spouse to provide us with everything we need. Also, I believe that with time, I will be supporting him in paying school fees for our children so that he can at least start saving some money.

In my opinion, GiveDirectly does well by giving out unconditional financial aid and I do not see anything that they do not do well.

I spent KES 10000 from my transfer to buy three goats. I decided on this since they increase in number quickly and I can also easily sell one when faced with financial crisis. From the remaining amount, I spent KES 25000 to pay school fees for my children. We decided on this as a family so that they would not be sent back home. Also, this will give us ample time to look for their next terms fee. In addition to this, I spent around KES 5000 to start a grocery business in our neighborhood. This will enable me to be self reliant. Using the remaining amount, I bought food to last us for some time.

I was from the farm heading home when I met one of my friends who asked me if I had received the transfer. I told her I had not. I then went home, now with so much eagerness in me having known that people had started receiving the transfers. I kept checking my phone as I prepared lunch for my family. As I was still busy going about with the work in the kitchen, I heard my phone ringing notifying me of an incoming SMS. I immediately stopped what I was doing and rushed to my phone to check the contents of the SMS. I was filled with so much happiness when I read the message which was indicating that w had received the lump sum transfer as well. I called my husband who was away to work and informed him of the good news. He was so happy to hear this and I could hear him laughing with joy on the other end. I thanked God because I knew the plans that we had made were now going to be fulfilled.

The transfer has brought a big difference in our lives. We have been able to clear school fees for our children and hence we will no longer have stress hustling the money to do so. Our children will hence be able to study well without worries that they will be sent home due to school fees arrears. With the iron sheets that we bought and the little money that we still have for labor, we will be able to construct the store that we have always wanted to have. This way, we will be able to move the timber that is in the kitchen to the store and any other thing in the household that needs to be stored like maize. Our children will hence not experience any inconveniences and they will be able to sleep well. The one bag of maize that we bought will enable us to have something to eat for a while as a family and hence we will not be having worries about where to get the money to do the above. Our children are also happy because they have been able to get new clothes for themselves.

The transfer from GiveDirectly has helped me a lot. I bought some iron sheets with it that I plan to use on the construction of a store. I was also able to buy a bag of maize, some clothes for the children, and I cleared paying their school fees. I still have some amount that I plan to use in paying for the labor once the construction of the store kicks off. We decided to build a store with the transfer because we have been lacking somewhere to store our things. There was some timber that we had bought a while ago that we were planning to use in the construction of another house and we had to store them in the kitchen because we lacked somewhere to place them. This however caused inconveniences for our children who usually sleep in the kitchen. The kitchen is small and hence space was not enough. We also decided to clear the school fees with this transfer that we got because that is what is always our biggest challenge. I depend on small-scale farming to earn a living and my husband usually does the motorbike business of moving people from one to another. The money that we usually get from the two activities has mostly been going to the payment of school fees for our children. It has hence not been possible for us to do any other developments because of lack of enough money.