Do you have anyone in your block list?
Is Awara a system where many commanders might go?
Open is mostly empty because space/galaxy is huge (20,000+ systems in the 'Bubble' alone).
Mainly, one must go where others are, to be able to see them.
Also, there may be other players in your instance but you might not notice them. If you turn on Network Bandwidth Monitor (Ctrl-B), anything over 1k/s indicates presence of another player, IIRC...
Aso check the 4th tab(???) in the ship comms menu. This will show you if you have shared an instance with anyone else...