You are in luck, sending money is the only thing bitcoin can do. However if you want to switch back and forth between bitcoin and fiat then you are going to pay for that. Fiat currencies come with lots of rules that you must obey to use. Bitcoin does not have these rules, but if you must involve fiat you gain little.
A much better plan is to use the bitcoin to directly buy things when you get back to Viet Nam. You many find only placed on the net, but you will save money this way.   In the future you may find more places to spend.

I want to say yes, but...

There is some risk of it hurting crypto if people think that ETH and BTC are alike. IMO, the ETH system is no where near as robust as BTC. If the owners of ETH decide to "fix" something or change the supply, etc. Then people may find out that their smart contract tokens are not what they thought. And then think that BTC can be monkeyed with as well.

Yesterday I watched the price dropping while trying to place an order.
The coinbase delay cost me like $50 in BTC value. 

Hmmm. There are no "accounts" in Bitcoin. Bitcoin started in 2009, so you must mean 2009.

Were you using an online wallet service?
At the time there was only one exchange MtGox. Does that ring a bell?

Were you running a bitcoin wallet on your machine?
Most of us were in 2009. In that case you need to find your "private key" or a copy of your old wallet. Nothing else will work.

Do you have any info about any Tx you have done? Or a "public key(address)?"

Totally agree. Besides, we bitcoin folk don't make rules for each other. It's your money to use the way you see fit.

Well... ETH is a different animal. It does not have the qualities that I require in a coin and so I won't be using it at any price. One day I fear the ETH owners are going to monkey with the code and then people will figure this out, albeit too late.

I'm currently very interested in Africa's bitcoin future. I am going to visit there at the start of 2018 and find out more.

This is not really news. There have been Tesla sales for years now.
Look at just overstock cars, you can buy any car you want at just that one site.

https://cars.overstock.com/

Forbes wishes. lol
Nope we are going to put your banks in the trash bin. 

What a load of crap this article is.

Bitcoin is money. So...
Money attracts the greedy.
Money attracts criminals.
Since it can do great things, it may also bring out the best in us.
One can hoard money.
Spend money.
Save money.
Donate money.

But there is no way to create a free money system  that demands it be used in a certain way and not another.  Try thinking bigger than that! What will I do with my money! who cares what you do with yours! The successful think about their affairs not the affairs of others in the market.

I like how another outlet attributed yesterday's price drop to Mark Cubans remarks. It shows how little they know. I would guess that 90% of the bitcoin sold yesterday was to people who don't speak English and have no clue who this guy is.  The American press keeps thinking this is an American thing. In reality America is just another player and in no way special. Asia is currently the world leader in bitcoin. What Xi Jinping  or Shinzō Abe says is important. But Mark... who?

You should ONLY be dealing with an exchange that is a licensed business in your country.  There are so many people who don't do this and wind up in trouble. I have never had such problems because I could just call the police or have the lawyer send them a demand.

If you are trying to evade taxes or something by using an unlicensed exchange or other method, then the thieves are going to move in and rob you blind. They know there is not a damn thing you can do about it. No one is going to help a criminal get his money back, but if you have the law on your side you have leverage.

I'm not sure what law they mean? But you may have answered your own question. If it is illegal then you will have to trust your bitcoins to criminals. Good luck with that.

It is not a good sign that you don't know this.  
Any investment you make of anything starts with the understanding that this is a risk and you should be prepared to lose ALL THE MONEY. Never trade while fearful or hopeful. Fear and hope have no place in mathematics and lead to incorrect decisions.  
Having said that, bitcoin will not go to zero. Hell, I would pay a penny for every coin in existence, so there. But let's talk about what you are doing. Bitcoin was never envisioned as an "investment". You can speculate with it, but that is not what it is. Bitcoin is money. That's all, nothing more.

A risk averse way to live off bitcoin is to buy say $500 worth and spend it when the price doubles. Then repeat the process. You will be living at a 50% discount on the items you buy. Whatever your plan, have a plan. Forget what others are doing, don't read the click-bait nonsense on the crypto news sites. Work your plan.

So all those who think that fees are "high" should be mining. If they actually were high then you will be able to successfully compete with those miners. Fees go to the miner who will transfer bitcoins profitably. If the fee is to low then it wont be picked up by anyone. If the miner demands too much then another miner will take his/her business. That is the protocol. So if you think money is being left on the table then here is your chance to get it.

I agree with your basic premise, but there is also the idea that we are not going to tell each other what to do with our money. That is the hard part about freedom. Freedom is not when you get to do what you want. It is when you are willing to allow others to do what you don't want them to do.

I was going to quote the same thing. So I'll just second your comments.
The price of bitcoin is not the big deal. Bitcoin is a breakthrough in financial freedom unlike anything else.
Screw the price, I only care about the features of bitcoin that make it MY MONEY. 

These comparisons always turn out to be apples to oranges. Crime is changing and bitcoin is part of that, but so is facebook, so is twitter, so is online banking. That is no reason to blame bitcoin and think the future must be stopped.
In the late 1930 the first powerful cars hit the roads in America and spawned a huge crime wave. Local police had no response to this technological advance. One could rob a bank, then race to the state or even county line and be untouchable. Some people called for a ban on cars. But of course eventually sane minds won out.

Or why not use an exchange like a grown-up?

You are asking sound questions, but can I suggest that you'll want to do more reading before pulling the trigger on that much money? Bitcoin, ETH, and Litecoin are not the same things. They may all have a future serving different use cases. It would be foolish to not learn a lot about any alt-coin before "investing" in it. They are 99.9% scams. Not that LTC or ETH are scams, but at least in the case of ETH you are agreeing to very different terms.

I think of it this way. If ETH and LTC still exist in 10 years, then its likely crypto won. BTC would almost certainly exist and be worth a lot. But if  BTC still exists in 10 years, there is only a possibility that ETH and LTC are still being traded. If on the other hand BTC is gone in 10 years then it seems likely that all crypto is dead.

If my assumptions are correct then buying BTC is your safest bet and diversifying with other crypto-currencies is not advisable because their success is tied to BTC.

If you want to lay down grown-up money on crypto then make sure that:

• You know exactly what you are buying.
  You are capable of losing money.
  You are meeting your tax obligations.
  You have a plan for secure storage of private keys.
  

The list above are all absolutely essential elements.

When you are ready to buy then you will likely want to use an exchange. Make sure that it is a licensed business in your country. Fund your account using a bank traceable route like a wire transfer. Buy some BTC. (how to get a good price is another topic) Then immediately send the coins from the exchange to a private key under your complete and exclusive control.
That last part is underlined for a reason. Until you have exclusive ownership of the private key then you don't have any bitcoin. Large amounts are best kept with keys in "cold storage" in a bank vault.

I would forget about PayPal or any such scammer non-sense. Never ever use any reversible method or deal with people outside of exchanges. Just set up a boring account. It is possible to find a private buyer for an amount that large, but it is difficult and comes with many risks. And again, consider avoiding alts. If you really get to understand BTC then you may well conclude none of them can compete.

Best of fortune in your endeavor.  If you stick to the basics I think you will see profits.