Get value from xml file.....fast

[StrangerInBeijing]

First off, I'm new to php, soo..... (yes, I'm studying, but did not get to xml yet)

This is for an experiment I'm busy with re multilingual sites. I want to figure the best performing method, and then create a sample solution for all to share.

For this specific test, I want to store text in xml files like this:

<text id="lblHome">
  <en>Home</en>
  <ja>家</ja>
  <zh>家庭</zh>
  <description>Link to the home page</description>
</text>
<text id="lblWork">
  <en>Work</en>
  <ja>仕事</ja>
  <zh>工作</zh>
  <description>Link to the Work for Us Page</description>
</text>

in my code I want to be able to call a function to get the text like this:

<h1><?php GetText('lblHome'); ?></h1>

In an included file a function like this (pseudo code):

function GetText(value)  {
  $lang = get the current language from session
  load xml file
  $text = get value of X node for given value parent node (X will be 'en', 'ja', 'zh')
  return $text;
}

What I would like to know is the best way to only read a value from an xml file quickly. From the code I looked at earlier, it seems one loop through the xml file...this does not sound right to me (but then, I had a quick look)