The dining hall in the Oldenborg Center is the perfect place to practice your foreign language skills.

And if that word “assimilate” rings a bell, it may be worth noting the unsubstantiated rumor that Pomona's well-documented connection with Star Trek and later Trekkie sequels may have included the naming of a certain cyborg nemesis after a certain labyrinthine residence hall that will, of course, go unnamed.

What we know for sure is that each year, more than three-fourths of all Pomona students participate in one or more of Oldenborg's programs, which include guest speakers in the International Relations Colloquia, a foreign film series, and daily language tables in as many as 20 languages ranging from Russian to Tagalog, Chinese to Farsi, Hungarian to Nepali, American Sign Language to Swedish.

Oldenborg also includes a residence for 140 students who choose to live in wings dedicated to six cultures and languages -- Chinese, French, German, Japanese, Russian, and Spanish.