The streets of Iranian cities are dirty. The dust billows beneath pedestrians’ feet, and everywhere you look, life plays out in hues of ochre and umber.

That seems to be a fairly common view many Americans have of the majority of Middle Eastern countries: barren, sandy and inhospitable. But in reality, many picturesque towns dot the countryside. Iran sports a diverse landscape, similar in many ways to the United States. There are mountains, waterfalls, deserts and forests full of trees and flowers. In fact, Shiraz, Iran, is known as the city of roses and poets. It’s also the namesake of Shiraz wine.

Shiraz spreads out like a garden at the foot of the Tang Allah-o-Akbar Mountains in southwestern Iran. The city has earmarked an abundance of land for parks, gardens and common city centers, and the streets are wide and lined with trees.

The name Shiraz has been synonymous with learning, nightingales, poetry, roses and wine. The city also boasts an assortment of intricate monuments and mosques, and one of Iran’s premier institutes of learning, the University of Shiraz.

This is the homeland of Reza Shams. Although he has lived in Lawrence – give or take a few short stints in Kansas City – for 30 years, he began life in Shiraz. One of nine children, Shams whittled away days biking along an 8-kilometer-long roadway, blooming with rosebushes.

A Canadian visitor takes photographs at the home of Lawrence resident Reza Shams' parent's home in Shiraz, Iran. Despite American perceptions of much of the Middle East as barren and brown, Shams says his ancestral homeland is full of beautiful gardens and monuments.

“We used to visit grape-growing farms in the spring and summer months as a place that was pleasant to see. We would load up in my father’s World War II Jeep and drive out to this beautiful green space with waterfalls,” Shams recalls “In the country, there would be rows of grapes growing to the horizon line.”

Misunderstood land

Founded in the seventh century, Shiraz has been the capital of Iran at several points in history. The city’s history is one of commerce, a place where merchants would sell grapes, citrus fruits, cotton, wheat, pistachios, dates, inlaid silver trinkets, rugs and textiles. In the spring, Shiraz transforms into a field of flowers and greenery, heady with the scent of orange blossoms, and the skyline is often framed by large, erect cypress trees standing at attention like soldiers in a row.

Shams, who considers Lawrence home, says Americans misunderstand his ancestral homeland. We tend to see only the crowded cities and the desert areas in the news, he says.

“My boyhood home had a wonderful perennial garden, with honeysuckle and other fragrant flowers. Gardens in Iran tend to be very aromatic,” Shams says. “Almost every home has a narang tree, which is similar to an orange tree, but the fruit has a rougher skin and it tastes more sour. But the scent in the spring was lovely.”

Turmoil and decline

Shams came to the states in 1976 to attend Kansas University. He spoke no English, but a friend who was attending KU turned him on to Lawrence. Shams now has a doctoral degree, is vice president of advanced process technology at Bio-Microbics, Inc., in Shawnee, and occasionally teaches a class at KU.

A view of Iran in springtime belies the commonly held belief that the country resembles a large desert. In the springtime, Shiraz, Iran, is filled with flowers and greenery.

Each year, he returns to Shiraz to visit his family. He admits it’s not the same city in which he grew up.

“What happened to Shiraz, and most other large cities of Iran, is the boom of population and the migration into the cities and out of the countryside. In the past (40 years ago and before), the houses were large, and people used to plant trees and flowers in their gardens,” he says. “However, with the growth of the population, individual houses have shrunk in size, and more and more apartments are being built. Today’s Shiraz is not the same city it was when I was growing up, where trees and flowers were a fixture of the architecture of the home.”

The city possesses the bones to be a beautiful place again, but people need to take personal responsibility and give the land the attention and respect it deserves, Shams says.

“It is sad because the nonprivate areas are unkempt,” he says. “The homes are behind high walls, and behind those walls are gorgeous gardens that people treat with extreme care.”

Shirazian families prepare food and take it to parks or spread out a blanket and enjoy a meal on the Avenue of Roses, a popular destination for social events. Iranian people stay out in the parks and at the bizarre until late into the evening.

But a barrage of constant conflict can change the landscape of a once-pristine place, where poets gathered, cypress trees towered and the breeze was heavy with a bouquet of aromas.

“The people of Shiraz used to live for the day,” Shams laments. “A merchant would make enough money from one sale to close down his shop and go enjoy a beautiful day.”

Although it’s not the Shiraz of yesteryear, there are still many fantastic gardens to visit in the city. Far from a lifeless dust bowl, the land still supports flowers, trees and meadows of grapes. Shams assures that Shiraz remains a beautiful spot for nature lovers and a colorful kaleidoscope of diverse flora.