"It was late in the evening say around 8:00pm when I received money from GiveDirectly. All along I had heard people from across the village celebrating having received theirs earlier in the day. I waited patiently for my turn until I surely received the money at around 8:00 pm that day. I called my wife who equally was very happy and we brainstormed on what we had agreed to spend the money on. The following day we went to the nearest mpesa agent withdrew the money and bought two heifers on that same day."

"We spent most of the transfer money on buying a cow. We bought the cow at KES 30000. This was our priority upon getting the transfer. This is because we didn't have a cow, and hence we wanted one so that it could help us in terms of getting milk and in the future with the children's school fees payment. We had a cow before but unfortunately, it died due to some disease hence leaving a calf behind. As a result, we have been incurring the cost of buying milk, where we usually buy a cup or two at times when we get money. We were not able to buy one before because we didn't have the money needed. I am a farmer and the little money that I get from selling vegetables is what I use in buying food for my family of seven, and some household goods such as sugar, soap, etc. My husband on other hand usually does the business of buying and selling chickens and the money that he makes usually goes to school fees payment for our five children, that is, one in university, one in secondary school, and three in primary school. Other than buying the cow, we also spent KES 15000 on paying school fees for our children, the one in university and secondary school. With the remaining amount of money, we used it in buying food and some household necessities. We are thus grateful to GiveDirectly because we no longer incur the cost of buying milk like before."

"The transfer has brought a very big difference in our lives as a family. We are now relieved and with some peace of mind having managed to build another house. We have not yet fully completed it but once it is so, we will be able to have enough space for ourselves and the children. We can now hence fully concentrate on other things, that is, finding money for our children's school fees."

"It was around 11 pm and we were already asleep. Suddenly, we heard a phone ringing hence notifying us that there was a new message. This jolted us from our sleep and we wondered what could the SMS be all about at this time. We decided to check it and to our surprise, we found out that it was an SMS saying that we had received the promised transfer of KES 55000 from GiveDirectly. We were so happy on seeing this that we woke up our children who were already asleep and we told them the good news. They were so happy on hearing this and we celebrated together giving thanks to God for the blessing."

"I am epileptic highly depending on medicine that I get from a local government facility. I spend about KES 2000 on this despite that I don't have a source of income. In late 2021, I found someone who can properly treat me but this is very expensive. To deal with this condition I will spend about KES 10,000 on this medication. I will the n spend about KES 30,000 on buying a dairy cow. It will beimportant to have milk that will earn me a daily income. I hope to be able to meet my dayly needs properly, mainly food and payng school fees for my children easily, once I have this cow."

"Receiving this money means that I can grow fodder for my dairy cows and improve my farming,using about KES 20,000. I desire to have high productivity from my cows. This will give me an income so that my husband can finally retire and come home. He is already spent, in my opinion, but he does not accept to leave his tailoring job because we do not have another source of income. I will also buy one more heifer to keep at about KES 40,000 and improve my home through constructing a more decent house than the mud house that I currently live in.in my old age I need a cleaner environment and I will spend about KES 20,000 on this."

"Lack of enough food for my household is the biggest challenge that I face.I am relying on a small business, vending bananas in a nearby town. From this I earn about KES 500 on a good day. Market days occur only twice a week. This means that I have to budget well to buy enough food that can last us until the next time when I can go to the market again.Having yo also meet other needs like school fees anf upkeep money for the school going children means that I cannot always buy enough foodstuffs."

"It has been my wish to electrify my house with solar panel, but it has not been easy for me to raise such an amount of money. As a farmer, it was a very difficult task for me to get huge sum of cash. Now I have electricity in my house and I don't have to go to my neighbors houses to charge my phone again. This is a big achievement for me and also my biggest happiness. It makes me feel proud."