Empty. The opposite of full

I spent a few hours at our Other Office today. It's where our Billing and IT department sits, so lots and lots of really smart people, many of whom do things I couldn't even begin to wrap my head around.

It's a fairly big place, three floors of office space and one with conference rooms. And it's so quiet. Sitting here, I have to stop tapping away at my laptop to even hear other voices anywhere. I fully expect tumbleweeds made out of disused LAN cables to roll by at any moment. It's like an IT ghost town.

And really, it's not about the fact that there's about two empty workspaces for every one that is occupied. It's about the silence that seems to rule unchallenged here. That people just sit down and work. I was quite shocked when two people walked by, talking loudly. Surely these had to have been from outside, from another company, or another office at least?

And now I heard laughing. Distant. Muted. Through an open window, no doubt.

I'm not being an asshole here. I'm just curious as to why a company can have two offices so close to each other that feel completely different, on a cultural level. While being a bit of a smart-ass about it.