Here is example code using XPath that might be what you are looking for. I put the XML from your question in a file called 'xmlexample.xml'. XPath doesn't know that the whitespace in your XML isn't part of the email address, so this example strips the whitespace from the returned result.

use strict;
use XML::XPath;
 
my $xp = XML::XPath->new(filename => "xmlexample.xml");
my $oldemail= $xp->findvalue('/transactionUpdate/transaction/customerE
+mails');
$oldemail =~ s/\s//g;  # Get rid of whitespace
print $oldemail,"\n";
[download]

Thanks to mirod for providing XML::XPath lessons in the ChatterBox!

It should work perfectly the first time! - toma