it was greener (grassland, savannas) but definitely not a rain forest.
And in fact it was also the same for Arabia. More grassland and savannas than today.
But it was only partial: there was some desert area too.
They were just not a large and mostly very dry desert like today.
Yes the clean and efficient alternative would be a session manager "server" running on the server and communicating with the terminal "client" (like kitty) using a more efficient protocol for handling panes/windows/drawing etc...