"I have a three-bedroomed house. The room that my boys live in is in a bad state. Part of the wall is cracked and any little force applied to the wall will bring it down anytime. The roof on the other part is in a poor state. The Makuti used in making the roof was blown away by the wind during the night and we had to invent something to cover the situation in the meantime. We covered the wide-open area with a big black plastic polythene paper. When I received the transfer I ordered some Makuti worth KSH 1500 that will be used to repair the affected part of the roof. In addition, I spent KSH 1000 buying food for the family. I currently don’t have a job and I find it difficult to provide for my family. With the ongoing drought situation in our area getting water for my home use has been very difficult. Due to the difficulties, we opt to buy water at very high prices from the water vendors. I spent KSH 500 purchasing the water."

"The biggest challenge is insufficient finances that are brought about by inconsistent income. The small chicken business that my husband operates is not sustainable as many people around our area also own lots of chicken. If he's lucky to sell, it is with low prices. Sometimes he is forced to track with chicken for more than ten kilometers to a bigger town so that he can fetch better prices"

"I am physically disabled. I live all by myself in the village. I depend heavily on my two sons who are casual laborers in the city. This means that when they do not send me money at times I do spend several days without eating anything. I have always depended on my small farm at the back of my house to grow small food products such as cassava, maize, vegetables, and other foodstuffs. This has not been possible for the past few years and it has made me fully dependent on my sons for my survival. When I received the second transfer I spent a huge portion of the transfer on buying food. The drought situation has made everything expensive and with no food, on my farm, I have to buy everything from the shop. I spent a total of KSH 2500 on buying food. To me, this was the right step to take since my sons had not sent me anything for the last two months and my food stock in the house was almost getting finished. I also spent the remaining KSH 500 in buying water for my use at home. With my condition, I cannot go about fetching water. Water is very hard to find these days and one has to walk for several kilometers to get it cheaply otherwise you have to buy it at very high prices from the vendors."

"I have a daughter who is in a boarding secondary school. Things have been getting tough on me financially and I have not been able to get some money to clear the school fee debt. My daughter owes the school a KSH 12000 debt for this term. Raising this money by myself has proved to be a very difficult thing for me. I currently do not have a job. My other children who are still in primary school also depend on me. My daughter has for the past month been sent home severally to come home and pick school fees. This has also affected her academic performance in school and has left me very stressed about it. Immediately after I received the transfer, I spent KSH 1000 in paying school fees for my daughter. I spent the rest of the amount on buying food for my family. Due to the harsh economic conditions affording to buy food is also very difficult as prices are becoming very high."

"Poverty comes with many challenges. Our family has been barely sleeping on the floor as we could not afford money to buy extra beddings. Food is also a challenge as we rarely harvest enough due to high prices of fertilizer. Children also sometimes fail to go to school sometimes as they have very few clothes. I believe most of these problems will be overcome due to this program."

"I take care of my aging mother, plus my expecting wife, and our two children. The responsibility is overwhelming, especially with the current drought. Water and food have become rare commodities in my village. For water we have to walk 12km away from my village, prices of food, on the other hand, have also hiked up."

"At this age, I have no energy left to get out there to toil and provide for my grandchildren. Two of my daughters separated from their husbands and came back with the children. As their mother, I had no choice rather than receiving them back even though I'm not in a position to help them. One of the daughters is here and the other one went to the city where she works as a domestic house manager. I appreciate the fact that she sends Ksh1500 every month but this amount is not enough to buy enough food for all of us and pay for school fees. With hiked food prices, we can only afford one meal a day and some days we even go without food. Receiving this money means that I will be able to provide basic needs for my family and pay school fees for my grandchildren."

"Initially we used to lit a huge fire at night to assist us in proving some light due to the high prices of paraffin which we were unable to purchase on daily basis. But currently, we have a solar panel that provides us with some light using bulbs and tube lights. There is a small difference between day time and night time at our home. We are happy for the aid we received from GiveDirectly."

"I divorced my husband some few years back due to irreconcilable differences and I came back to my parent's house with five children. Since then, life has not been easy for me since the my ex husband doesn't support his kids and I had to bear all the family responsibly including my mother who is very old. Since I don't have a formal job, I have been dependent on the charcoal burning business to earn a living. Before this drought season, the business was not bad as now because it could earn me Ksh 2500 per week. Nowadays, it's been hard to cater to my family's basic needs and pay school fees because the charcoal prices have gone down and I have almost depleted the available trees. Receiving this money means that I will be able to provide for my family and pay school fees for my children."

"I used to farm and harvest enough food to take us through the drought season but with the prolonged drought, it has been two years since we had good harvest season. This has made food prices to hike and we can hardly afford two meals a day."